What is a skin abscess? Dermal skin abscesses are caused by a confined accumulation of pus and can present as swollen, red, painful and fluctuating masses. It is often associated with peripheral cellulitis. Skin abscesses can often be diagnosed by a simple physical examination, and incision and drainage can confirm the diagnosis. What should I pay attention to when I have a skin abscess? 1. Do not squeeze the pus by hand in order to squeeze it out, because this will often aggravate the infection and bring more trouble. 2. Once the boil breaks, you should clean the affected area with medical alcohol or light saline in time, and continue to maintain the hygiene of the affected area and go to the hospital for further treatment. What is the treatment method for skin abscess? 1. Incision: A single incision should be long enough to ensure complete drainage. A blunt instrument should be used to separate the abscess cavity, and the incision should be made according to the tension line to reduce the formation of scars. A common mistake is that the incision is not deep enough to reach the abscess cavity and complete drainage. Special care should be taken when incising the skin past important blood vessels and nerves. Patients with signs of systemic infection should be treated with systemic antibiotics. 2.Placement of drainage: there is often bleeding after superficial abscess incision, if there is no active bleeding, the bleeding can be stopped by filling the abscess cavity with gauze strips and compressing it generally, do not use hemostatic forceps to avoid damaging the tissue. When placing drainage, one end of the gauze should be placed at the bottom of the abscess cavity, not at the mouth of the abscess cavity to block the abscess cavity and affect the unobstructed drainage. The outer section of the drainage strip should be spread out so that the two edges of the incision are all separated, not just the central part of the incision, so as to avoid premature healing of the two ends of the incision, so that the drainage opening is reduced and drainage is affected. 3. Suturing: Suturing should be performed after the drainage of pus is clean. When suturing, for longer incisions (> 2 cm), especially in important areas involving aesthetics, sutures should be removed as much as possible.