Bathing after a Mastectomy

Dear Harpers13

Thank you for getting in touch with your question about bathing one week after your mastectomy surgery.  I hope things are going well for you in your recovery. My name is Gemma, and I am one of the cancer information nurse specialists here at the Macmillan support line.

I’m pleased to see that you have already had some great support from our friendly breast cancer forum and I will add to the information they have helped with.

There is some general advice, common with recovering from any surgery, and many breast care teams will have their own post-op rules to add to this: These are based on surgeon’s preferences, materials used for stitching and individual details about you yourself. So Kitty1’s signpost to check with your own breast care nurse is very good advice, we hope you managed to get through to yours while you waited for our reply.

Here at the charity run support line, we can help with sharing general cancer information. As we are separate from health care services we can’t access notes to be able to check on any individual advice or preferences your breast cancer service has.

That said, we hope the following information is helpful for you:

Waterproof dressings are notoriously not fully waterproof, so bathing with them on is not a good idea.  Any wet dressing against the skin will hold water, and bacteria, against the wound line and can cause issues with healing. It is best to think of these as splash-proof at best. As Kitty1 recommends it is best to not even allow the shower water to run directly on top.

After an operation, stitch lines should be kept dry until the skin on the outside is healed; this often takes a few weeks. Our bodies are clever in that they heal the outside skin first, this reduces the risk of infection getting into the deeper layers. 

There are usually dissolving internal stitches underneath that will take up to 10 weeks to dissolve as the deeper layers heal.  It’s important to keep the wound dry so that this process happens in the right way and the right amount of time.

I see you don’t have a shower to be able to have a full body wash. One solution might be to have a shallow bath with your ‘splash-proof’ dressing still on while you wash and dry your body. Then to do your wound care if you are changing your dressing yourself. Alternatively, you could time a shallow bath to just before a nurse appointment to change your dressing. It might be good to have help to wash your back and hair so that you don’t over stretch while you are healing.

Your breast team or dressings nurse will be able to tell you when you are able to wash your stitch line. As the skin heals it is still quite fragile and needs a delicate touch, so washing with your fingers is gentler than using a cloth or a sponge. It is usually advised to use a delicate, scent free soap for this. Be careful with baby products, as they can be very highly perfumed, and this can irritate newly forming skin. Using a clean towel or flannel to pat dry can protect it as the healing deepens; if you have an older, clean towel you could cut it into smaller pieces to save on the amount of washing you have to do.

Our support line nurses are here every day of the year. If you think it would help to chat things over in more detail with the opportunity to ask questions, please call us on 0808 808 000, 8am-8pm.

The charity Breast Cancer now also have some great information online you may like to look at.

Our ref: SMJ