Skin Grafts

LoneRider · Apr 14, 2012

A character I'm writing about, an Iraq War veteran, suffered severe second and third degree burns on his hands and arms. Several months later after being released from the hospital and back to civilian life (after his deployment as a reservist) he returns.

My question is what sort of immediate visual signs would be noticeable? I would imagine some sort of color contrast, i.e. his unburned skin is darker than the skin grafted area but I'm not sure.

narmowen · Apr 14, 2012

Texture.

eggs · Apr 14, 2012

Just pop 'skin grafts' into google images and you'll get a bunch of images from every stage of healing. From looking at them in the real world when they are well healed, the main visual impact is that not only is the texture (grain of skin, hair growth etc) very different, but the height of the skin is usually different too. The graft is often a few mm lower than the surrounding skin because when you get a catastrophic injury you don't just lose skin, you lose a lot of the fat and meat that sat beneath the skin too.

LoneRider · Apr 15, 2012

Thanks for the tip. About how long would it take for skin grafts around the forearms and hands to heal?

Skin Grafts

LoneRider

narmowen

Lost in the woods

eggs

LoneRider