Back in 1972 I was 17 years old, an active average weight teenaged girl in high school. I slipped on a throw rug and broke my coccyx (tailbone) and had to use a donut cushion for several weeks to prevent pain and allow the bone to heal. After a bit, one day I sat down on a bus with contoured seats and leaped up because of awful pain. I felt a large swelling, the size of 1/2 grapefruit, near the base of my spine. My dad, an MD, took one look at it and diagnosed pilonidal abscess. The very next day I had surgery to drain the infection, excise the inflamed damaged tissue and remove the debris inside the cyst. The surgeon explained that it was a congenital defect that was nursed when I fell, and that the dimple that I had always had at the base of my spine was the indication that I had the cyst. My mother told me that she had always wondered about that dimple, as she never saw another baby with one. Once the surgery was completed, My dad would take out the packing daily, clean it out with peroxide and then cauterize the wound with silver nitrate before repacking it wth gauze. Very very painful, and this lasted for 6 weeks. Also took 3 weeks of oral antibiotics. The good news is that it never reoccurred and that was 43 years ago. In no way was my cyst the result of obesity, lots of body hair or bad hygiene.
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Back in 1972 I was 17 years old, an active average weight teenaged girl in high school. I slipped on a throw rug and broke my coccyx (tailbone) and had to use a donut cushion for several weeks to prevent pain and allow the bone to heal. After a bit, one day I sat down on a bus with contoured seats and leaped up because of awful pain. I felt a large swelling, the size of 1/2 grapefruit, near the base of my spine. My dad, an MD, took one look at it and diagnosed pilonidal abscess. The very next day I had surgery to drain the infection, excise the inflamed damaged tissue and remove the debris inside the cyst. The surgeon explained that it was a congenital defect that was nursed when I fell, and that the dimple that I had always had at the base of my spine was the indication that I had the cyst. My mother told me that she had always wondered about that dimple, as she never saw another baby with one. Once the surgery was completed, My dad would take out the packing daily, clean it out with peroxide and then cauterize the wound with silver nitrate before repacking it wth gauze. Very very painful, and this lasted for 6 weeks. Also took 3 weeks of oral antibiotics. The good news is that it never reoccurred and that was 43 years ago. In no way was my cyst the result of obesity, lots of body hair or bad hygiene.
October 26, 2015 - 8:19pmThis Comment
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