How are chemical burns treated?
How are chemical burns treated?
Chemical burns require immediate treatment. Call 911 and then:
- Remove clothing: Use gloves to protect your hands. Cut away any clothing contaminated with the chemical. You want to prevent it from touching other areas of your body.
- Remove the chemical: Still wearing gloves, brush away any remaining dry traces of the chemical, but don’t wipe the chemical away. Wiping can spread it to other areas of your skin.
- Rinse with water: Rinse the burned area of your skin or eyes with cool water. Continue rinsing for at least half an hour, as chemicals can continue damaging your skin after contact. Try to keep the contaminated water from touching other parts of your skin. Certain chemicals should not be rinsed with water, including carbolic acid or phenol, sulfuric acid, dry powders and metal compounds.
- Drink water: If you swallowed a chemical substance, drink water to dilute it in your stomach. Don’t take anything to make yourself vomit. Vomiting a chemical substance can cause more damage as it comes back up through your esophagus.
Then, get to a hospital. The American Burn Association recommends that anyone with a chemical burn should seek care at a burn center or call the National Poison Control Hotline (1-800-222-1222) immediately for information on treatment. A burn center is a unit of a hospital dedicated to burn treatment. If you go to the emergency department, they may refer you to a burn center.
Once you arrive at the hospital, your healthcare team will:
- Evaluate the severity of your burn.
- Continue rinsing your burn.
- Give you pain relievers if you’re uncomfortable.
- Apply antibiotics to your skin to prevent infection. Or, they’ll give them to you through a vein in your arm.
- Apply a dry dressing or bandage to mild or moderate burns.
If you have a severe burn, you may need surgery to remove the burned portion of your skin. Some people need a skin graft. A surgeon takes healthy skin from elsewhere on your body and attaches it to the burned area. Surgery can also repair perforations in your gastrointestinal tract.