Hats off to any that wrap

I've been wrapping for years and yet I still reply on my DH to pass the wraps to me as they go around my arm.  I think he has heard more curse words than ........... well than anyone has. 

So, Marple, what you're saying is that wrapping is a relay event in the Olymphics! Sounds like it's a spirited event at your house!

Lymphedemaproducts.com incorrectly sent me 6 cm x 4 m gauze instead of 4 cm x 4 m gauze.  They were amazingly fast at sending me the correct stuff and told me to keep the wrong ones or donate them to a clinic.

 I'm not in active treatment and the LE clinic that I used to go to is 2 hours away, so I thought someone reading this thread might want them.  Please PM me if you would like them.  

15 BOXES of Transelast Classic 6 cm x 4 m (300 rolls!) 

I'll post to this thread when I have given them away.

KS1

Unfortunately, the gauze won't work out for hugz4u, so i PM me if you want:

=>>  15 BOXES of Transelast Classic 6 cm x 4 m (300 rolls)  <<= 

It probably makes more sense for someone living in the US because the box is big (23" x 15" x 11 and 10 lbs) so it's kind of pricey to ship. I just calculated it and, for UPS ground, it's about $23.50 to California, $18.50 to Chicago and $15.50 to NYC.  (For comparison, the gauze cost $175 +S/H for Lymphedemaproducts.com)

I have wrapped my arm just once now and didn't do a very good job of it.  Thankfully I have a DH who doesn't mind doing it for me, but I can't imagine how you women can manage to wrap yourselves.  So a BIG hats off to all of you.  The problem for me is that when my DH or therapist does the wrap, after a few hours my hand gets really crampy and painful.  So when I wrapped it myself yesterday I didn't do it as tight and I think I didn't get sufficient compression over my total arm.  When I took the bandages off this morning, it looked like the swelling didn't go down at all.  How frustrating. 

OK time to give this thread a boost. I know it's probably meant more for us ourselves who wrap, but I want take my hat off to my LEist. Ive been struggling with my arm flaring up for months now with varying degrees of success wrapping, results ranging from disgusting swollen lumps and bumps to mediocre reduction in swelling. I've been so brassed off with my efforts I fully admit to backing off the wrapping and just giving up partly because of pure negligence and partly because of other important responsibilities to attend to.



That negligence has even had me believing my case is impossible.



Well my LEist wrapped me at my appt couple of days ago and the result was stunning. It gives me hope not to give up (and I have been) and that it can actually be done with time... I guess some of us are just slow learners. (me included).

Thanks Binney. When good things happen yu'all will be sure to hear about it!



The advice on this board which says there's nothing that competes with wrapping (done correctly)is absolutely correct. Even though there's new garments coming out all the time and unless there's one I haven't heard of yet, I take it wrapping is still the gold standard.



Another great thing Ive experienced with wrapping is that LEist put in a little sponge spot at the crease of the elbow. WELL WHAT A DIFFERENCE! It was the difference between being able to bend my arm almost normally and thus do my daily chores or the whole thing feeling like a useless unbendable batten hanging at my side.

Dawne-Hope, I wrap the whole arm at night, and don't really wear day time compression much, at this point.

Those web spaces are tough, and what helps me, is foam "carrots" that I put in the web spaces. My wrap is stockinette--and your reaction suggests to me that you should consider the cotton stockinette and wash it first ( my LE therapist buys it, and she always puts a new one on me, and it washes just fine, so I have drawers of it...I keep telling her to reuse it--something like this--http://www.lymphedemaproducts.com/products/tg-jersey-tubular.html

Once, LindaLou posted an image of how she used very aggressive foam carrots--the orange foam.

I have a set up that a LE therapist created for me--there is a palm piece of grey foam, the carrots, a dorsum piece of grey foam that goes to the forearm, and a piece of grey foam to cushion the elbow. I put it all on with artiflex, do the finger wrap over it, then put on the rosidal soft, and then the short stretch bandages.

I did wrap only to the elbow for a while, early on, and got a pocket above the elbow.

As time is going on, I've cut back on the number of short stretch bandages and may try just to the elbow again.

I think the Linda Lou carrots picture is in her images thread, and so is an image of a bandage Steve Norton did on her: the key is to build up the dorsum and the palm as you get more compression, the "rounder" you make the hand.

The arm is a natural cylinder, but the hand is kind of flat. If you wrapped a book, the most pressure would be over the binding, and the pages--the ends. A hand is kind of shaped that way, but if you make it more like a circle, the pressure goes to the palm and dorsum. It's the "law of laplace".

When I took the Klose training class to become a CLT, they said to us, "You can call for help with a difficult case, but not before you try grey foam first."

Try some foam. There's all kinds, and KS1 did a really cool thing with the komprex spaghetti foam where she cut it so her fingers popped through, and it folded back on her palm and dorsum.

Listen to KS1, she's had really tough hand swelling and she's overcome it.

Hang in there.

Kira

Dawne-Hope, I think Kira is referring to LindaLou's pictures here at bc.org. Here's the link (I think!):

http://community.breastcancer.org/forum/64/topic/794153?page=1#post_3229671

Hope that helps!
Binney

Binney - thank you!



Will check them out tmrw.

My therapist wants to stick right now with the taping.  She did MLD on me today (which she always does), put the kinesio tape with the 'carrots' running alongside my tendons in the hand and then she put some tape on top of that tape (cut the same way) but had the 'carrots' running to the pinkie finger side of my hand.  She then wrapped my finger webs and hand (fingers free) and then I put my farrow glove on top of it.  I'm curious to know if the tape going to the side on top of the tape going down will make a difference.  We'll see ...

Great piks kira! thankyou and thanks to KS1 for allowing the piks....



Those finger bandages look so much better than what we get in NZ, or at least an my local chemist. Please tell me:



- Brandname?

- Are they sort of sticky(ish) where they self grip (looks like it where its folded at the top of hand in pik just above)

- Are they re-usable and if so how many times approx

- Are the edges salvaged (I think thats the word)

Quote

Transelast Classic is a white colored, firm grip bandage with a soft, close weave. The special knitting technique yields highly-elastic properties without containing elastic threading. This long-lasting bandage is both breathable and durable conforming well to body contours and is ideal for applications on edematous fingers and toes.

Unquote



Thanks kira. Your 1st link doesnt work, but is OK pasting into browser. WOW! this sound really great and everything I'd want if I can score it here. I'll be showing this to my LEist. Its soooo cheap. My bandages I get are great, slightly sticky extremely convenient BUT EXPENSIVE and if you spend a LOT of time carefully unwinding them, laying them out flat and gently washing, you might at a pinch get 3 uses, but usually its only 2. Theyre 3$ a pop!