Hello, I'm planning on using this technique to implant my m31. It's in the mail right now, but I'll have to schedule the implantation around things going on at work that would definitely agitate the wound. As such I've still got some time to plan things out, and wanted to ask if anyone had specific requests as far as documenting my experience goes.
I know for myself I would already like: - To video tape the procedure - An image with the needle at full depth, and another from the same angle demonstrating magnet placement afterwards - Daily photos of the wound healing
It's probably worth saying that I'm not a surgeon so I don't intend to teach anyone how to properly disinfect for such a procedure, finger anatomy, or such. I can't show you the "correct" way to do it, I can only document how I did it and what I experienced.
As has been said, this is not the advised method for implantation as unless you are super comfortable theres a good chance of nerve damage or heating meat. So if you insist on going this route be very very very very very goddamn careful.
Well, I made the attempt tonight and failed, but I'll share my story for the sake of others.
I started off soaking everything in Chlorhexidine Gluconate for a good hour, and scrubbed my hands off well rinsing them with saline. I managed to get the needle in about 4mm, and had already flipped it over before the skin split. Deciding I hadn't started deep enough, and still had plenty of room left to work with I continued, going just a tad bit deeper. Once I reached about 4mm along again and the pain was becoming pretty noticeable, I also began to feel more resistance trying to push the needle further. As I continued to push I was surprised to notice I was beginning to feel a bit nauseous.
I've never considered myself a squeamish person. I've taken self aid and buddy care classes where I've been exposed to videos of actual gaping wounds. The sight of my blood or anyone else's has never bothered me before, and there was nothing of that sort here, just a needle in a finger. I guess there's something to be said about the tactile feel of pushing through your own flesh when it's offering so much resistance as the thought of the skin splitting during your first attempt is fresh in your mind. At any rate, as much as I hate to admit it, the nausea got the better of me before I managed to get the needle in far enough for me to feel confident inserting the magnet. Not only that, but it was about the time I'd gotten the needle out that I realized I had forgotten to premedicate with Ibuprofen as I'd planned.
I know I'll regret it if I leave it at this, so the only question for me is whether to try again on a different finger in the next couple days or wait longer for my ring finger to heal enough for another go.
Don't feel bad about getting too nauseous to continue. I was close to that point myself a number of times when I did mine. Nausea is perfectly natural. As you browse around, you'll see stories of people outright fainting. It's even tougher to do without anesthesia. Humans are naturally wired to NOT do things like this. You'll do better next time. Even a failure is a kind of success because you learned along the way. Learned about your natural reactions, learned about your own tolerances, and gained some experience in implanting.
My personal recommendation would be to give it a few days and seriously consider a different finger. If you do want to implant in the same area of the same finger, make sure it's completely healed before you introduce new trauma to the site.
Also, if you think the pain was a significant source of the anxiety you were feeling, consider doing a digital nerve block. There is absolutely no shame at all in doing it. My choice to not do it is likely foolhardy, truth be told. Check out @Cassox's blog for information on how to do it (I think he still has that up there somewhere, or search Youtube for videos). You can get the needed supplies for it from Dangerous Things (look for the pain management kit). Do keep in mind that depending on where you live, using injected lidocaine may not technically be legal.
There is no shame in documenting failures. This is how we learn. If we only talked about successes, other people would not be able to avoid the mistakes that we make. Your fingers are very sensitive. It is completely unlike putting an rfid in the back of your hand. The fact you didn't pass out is pretty solid actually.
Using proper technique is very important and part of that means doing some lido when you are doing finger work. The last thing you want to do is twitch and mess something up. I have been know to do the minimum necessary procedural work from time to time and I would still never do finger work without lido. There's just no reason not to.
Good work on your sterilization and cleaning technique. I say try for another finger, since the more you mess with your current location, the more likely scarification may happen. That's not to say that at a later date you can't work on that finger, just that it really does need time to heal.
Yes, that was exactly it, thank you. I knew there was something different about the nausea that I couldn't quite place, but you reminded me of something. About 5 years ago I passed out at work when I was really sick one day. It was the EXACT same nauseous feeling I got right before I passed out back then. I didn't realize it while I was trying to do the implant, but I did know that it was a kind of nausea I shouldn't try to just grit and bear with. Thank you for confirming it for me.
Unfortunately, I don't believe Lidocain is really an option for me, I'll have to try again without it. I think I'll have a go again tomorrow, but I'm still considering whether to do a different finger on my left hand or the ring finger on my right hand.
Does DangerousThings and/or Amazon not ship to your region? DT has a really good pain management kit and while you could source all the parts from Amazon the ease of having a kit sent to you is pretty sweet.
I suggest still using your non dominant hand, probably the index. This is just for aftercare, as you really need to use your hand as little as possible for the next couple weeks.
Made the attempt again tonight on my left hand index finger.
Things went a bit more smoothly this time, and there was no nausea at all. I remembered the Ibuprofen, and I think the motivational music I put on helped quite a bit ("Row Row Fight the Power" I can't think of anything more motivating than Gurren Lagann) Unfortunately, I was too concerned with getting it done, and forgot to take any photos/video.
My finger is throbbing a little bit right now, but to my surprise there was very little pain during the procedure this go around. The worst part was shoving the magnet in, it took quite a bit of force to make the transition from the upper layers of skin to where it needed to be underneath. I pulled the plunger out of the RFID injector, and used that to push the magnet along, I just hope I managed to get the whole thing deep enough.
Congratulations, Fronon. Glad to hear it went better this time.
I'll throw a couple comments on depth in that may (or may not?) ease your mind. If you are talking about depth as in thickness of the skin over the magnet, according to @Cassox, you only really need a millimeter or so (possibly more if you have thick callouses on your fingers). If you mean distance of the magnet from the entry wound, bear in mind that when using a scalpel insertion, typically the pocket is about 5mm, meaning the edge of the magnet is, at best, about 2mm from the entry wound. Admittedly, sutures are usually involved which makes the whole thing more secure, but with a needle insertion like you've done, you've got a far smaller entry wound which will close up faster.
As you observed, getting the magnet past that outer layer of skin is difficult when you've used an RFID injector needle because the hole is physically smaller than the magnet. The inner tissue distorts to fit the magnet far more easily. Funny how easy it is to push the magnet the rest of the way in after it clears that outer layer of skin, isn't it? A bigger needle would make it easier to get in, but as you saw, it isn't really necessary.
For the m36 magnets, I'm going to be using an 8G piercing needle, which is quite alot larger. The too-small needle works for the m31 because its only 1mm thick, so you can sort of distort the opening in the flesh that the RFID needle makes into an oval that will accommodate the magnet. The m36, though, is 3mm in its shortest dimension and so will need a larger needle. Should be interesting to do. My 8G needles should arrive tomorrow. I suspect that the RFID injector needle would be able to slide very freely with space to spare into the hollow of the 8G. Fun stuff.
Side of both the left and right hands (i.e. the side with the little finger). I may buy a third and place it in the area between the index finger and thumb of the right hand, in the area usually used for RFIDs. Not entirely sure about that one yet, though.
No real change to the process with the exception of the larger needle. I intend to insert the needle nearer the wrist (but not at the wrist itself) and drive the needle toward the fingers (i.e. distally). I'm hoping for a full 2cm penetration of the needle just to be sure it doesn't get rejected. This is all pending some examination of the hand nerves and blood vessels, though, and could be subject to change if I don't like how the anatomy of the area looks in relation to my intended needle path.
Little update on the healing process since something of note has occurred.
After the first few days and bruising went down the needle path on my finger looked like a blood blister (possibly not enough pressure applied for long enough after removing tourniquet?) The blood inside had dried up so it was dark, and hard. I was worried the dried blood would get in the way of new tissue growth, but didn't want to risk causing unneccesary damage so I let it be. On the 9th day it still looked pretty much the exact same, and I decided to stop wearing band aids since there was essentially a scab filling the needle path anyway.
It wasn't long before I regretted the decision. On the exact same day I accidentally scraped my finger against a metal edge while working, and peeled the skin off over the entire needle path. Luckily I only got the upper layers of skin, and was left with a raw reddish pink patch without any bleeding. On the up side, it removed the dried blood, and I can now see that the rest of the needle's path into the deeper tissues is healing nicely despite the incident. There's only a tiny hint of the hole left filled with darker red tissue that looks somewhat... gooyer, I guess? It has a somewhat wet appearance, but after the initial wound cleaning hasn't been leaking any fluid. Needless to say, I'll be wearing band aids for a while longer anyway.
Ok for the sake of repeating myself till it hurts, regardless of how you got it in there, you should be triple anti-bacing and keeping it wrapped for AT LEAST 2 weeks if not longer. Feel free to read the post op care page on the wiki. This goes as a warning to everyone else. Keep your shit wrapped so it can heal.
So the skin broke up, the canal got smaller and smaller and here I decided to gave up on this finger, thought about what I did wrong and continued with the next one. (Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcag/magnetin-failure.jpg )
After it was under the skin I tried to use a piece of PTFE to get it to its final position. I used PTFE cause I thought it won't scratch the coating of the magnet for sure, but it didn't work (see below). (Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcll/ptfein.jpg )
For pain management I used the single-injection volar subcutaneous block as described here: http://file.scirp.org/Html/3-8202324_39554.htm - The only difference is that I used 2ml of a 1% Lidocaine application. No need to massage it in, you see how the finger swellows while injecting. These swelling goes to the sides (where the digital nerves are) pretty fast! 5 to 10 minutes after inserting the Lidocaine I didn't feel anything at my finger. (Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcic/lidoin2.jpg )
Now to the point about PTFE: Instead of pushing the magnet it just goes beside it. You never know if you're really pushing the magnet or not. Also the fingertips were swollen while operating, so I couldn't really check the magnets position at that time. Today (2 days after) I had a look: ("Higher" res: http://picload.org/image/igldipr/dsc-0163.jpg - sorry for the bad quality)
As you see it looks like I didn't move them at all! After seeing that I re-opened the middle finger (left on the last image) and tried to move the magnet with another tool and without Lidocaine - It was extreme pain and I think I just moved it 1 to 2 mm. Yes, I know I shouldn't re-open the finger and I shouldn't try to move it while it heals.
I hope the position of the magnets is still good in terms of pressure and nerve density.
In a few (min. 2) weeks I'll try the failed finger again. Any suggestions what to use to push the magnet?
Last words: The fingers are still (except at the time I re-moved the magnet in the middle finger) completely pain-free but also no magnetic sensations so far (I didn't search for them as I know it's to early to play with it).
Last images: Random photos of the procedure. Wished I had more for you and yes, more exist, I just can't get them as the photographer does... weird actions... :/
My two cents, @V10lator, for what it's worth (I hope at least two cents...)
Personally, I opted to start out closer to the joint so as to get a longer needle path than you did. The further it is from the opening in the flesh, the less likely it is to get pushed out as it heals, or so it seems to me anyway. Less tissue damage, though, if you go shorter, so if it works out, cool.
It looks in the pictures like you did not use a tourniquet, which will hamper this method, but if you shine a bright light through the finger, you can physically see where the magnet is sitting, at least if you've gotten most of the blood out of it first. Also, using another neodymium magnet outside the finger, you should be able to both tell where the magnet currently is while working AND use it to assist in pulling the magnet to the correct position.
I had no issues with my fork tine taper going beside the magnet as I pushed the magnet in. Maybe the diameter of your piece of PTFE is too small? A taper nearly the size of the pierced hole in the tissue would ensure you are hitting the magnet no matter what. And I don't know how rigid the PTFE is, but with the fork tine, I could clearly feel when I tapped it onto the magnet (i.e. tapping something hard feels very different than tapping something soft). I was able, each time, to just insert my "taper", feel that it was hitting the magnet, and push. I just pushed it until it bottomed out in the needle canal, then pushed a little more for good measure (painful, though, but I wasn't numbed at all).
Hopefully the ones you've got in end up being all good. Personally, I'd probably wait a little longer then two weeks for the redo if you're targeting the same position on the finger, but depending on how fast you heal, you may feel good to go after two weeks.
At any rate, congrats regardless, and best of luck!
Of course your talking is worth more than two cents, after all you developed this implanting method. :)
Yea, I opted for less tissue damage. With a scalpel they are making just a 5 mm canal IIRC, so I thought my canal should be long enough.
I used a hair tie as tourniquet, you see it on the picture with the piece of PTFE. Anyway, no matter how tight I tried to get it (I used one of my tools to get if even tighter that I was able with bare hands alone) it still bleeded, the bleeding just reduced. I think this is caused by the swelling of the Lidocaine (which is also why I didn't try to get the blood out of the finger; I thought I could move the Lidocaine with it which could be bad). I tried using a needle, a surgical blade as well as another m31 to check the position but even the other m31 wasn't strong enough, I could move the other m31 around 5 mm and it would still stick to the finger, so all I was able so say was that the magnet is inside of the canal but not where exactly. I tried to move it with the other m31, too, but I don't think it worked.
I think you're right and my needle was too small, I even used a surgical blade to cut the incision point around 0,5 to 1 mm more before I could get the magnet inside (and even then a lot of force was needed). Sorry, english isn't my native language and I'm pretty sure you don't need a candle with "taper". Do you mean something like that?
I hope they're good, too. Shortly after writing here I got my first two magnetic sensations; my PC monitor has some (I guess) static fields, they're almost not detectable, and my microwave, well, you know that feeling. :) I'm not sure when I'll retry again, min. 2 weeks was just a rounded guess, cause as you said it depends on the healing process (I'm wearing nothing more than a small plaster over that finger, cause what isn't in can't be rejected and that way I have one more finger for daily tasks. On the other side the lesser protection + using it for daily tasks might slow down the healing).
Thanks, also thanks for all your helpful talking. :)
I wish I was fluent in German so I could be more help to you.
You are probably right about pushing the blood out of the finger when using lidocaine. Even if nothing bad happens, it would still likely reduce the lidocaine's effectiveness.
The magnet I used outside the finger was larger than the m31. I do not know the strength, but it was approximately 1cm in diameter and 2-3mm thick.
The taper is the equivalent of your piece of PTFE. In my case, it was the tine of a plastic fork (one of the points of a plastic fork).
Congrats on getting your first sensation, by the way.
Unless you're applying local anesthesia to the implant site itself, I fail to see how pushing the blood out of the finger would affect the anesthesia at all. If it somehow does, though, just establish your bloodless field first, and then perform the nerve block (Though the tourniquet might get in the way).
@TheGreyKnight: I thought I would push it from the finger into the hand. Also I feared micro-tissue damages caused by this movement which could rise the absorption speed and as a result higher the Lidocaine concentration in the blood to a dangerous level (after all it was 6 ml - still not enough to fear about if the injections are done correctly but I thought better safe then sorry, especially as I'm not medically ensured - I'm my own doctor since around 10 years - but a Lidocaine overdose is something you need emergency help ASAP, before it blocks important parts of your central nerve system).
@FrankMatheson So there's no problem with micro-damaging the tissue / pushing the lidocaine into the hand? If that's true I'll definitely try it next time. :)
The amount of lidocaine used for the procedure is pretty hard to have a problem with. The lidocaine is used in two different ways, depending on who you go to. Cassox did mine and he used both methods. Nerve blocking is numbing the nerves below the finger so that the signals can't pass from the finger to the brain, so you don't feel the pain. Local injection is putting the lidocaine into the finger directly, so as the blood circulates in the finger, the nerves get numbed. Once the lidocaine takes effect, a tourniquet (pushing the blood out of the finger) shouldn't be a problem because the nerves have already been affected. Cassox used a rubber o-ring that fit over my finger (like a wedding ring) to do this. Establishing a bloodless field shouldn't have any effect on the distribution of lidocaine as long as you let it do its work before you do so (5-7min).
My right hand (7 Hayworth magnets) was done via cutting and OMG the drama! My left was done via needle by Samppa VonCyborg sooooo much better. Less pain better healing.
"Ok for the sake of repeating myself till it hurts, regardless of how you got it in there, you should be triple anti-bacing and keeping it wrapped for AT LEAST 2 weeks if not longer. Feel free to read the post op care page on the wiki. This goes as a warning to everyone else. Keep your shit wrapped so it can heal. "
That's how both my m31's rejected. constantly keeping triple-bac on the implant site every day kept the implant site wet and you want to keep the location clean and dry for it to heal properly.
Yea, I would also say don't overuse the triple-bac. When the wound is sealed bacteria shouldn't get a way in anyway, except when the sealing breaks (the scab being softened by a gel, for example).
In fact there should even be powders available which might be much better than a gel. I mean this powders are designed for wet wounds but a little bit of sweating (below the bandage) or wound fluid (from a broken scab) should activate it, too, and it might even have a way longer anti-bac effect this way.
Comments
I know for myself I would already like:
- To video tape the procedure
- An image with the needle at full depth, and another from the same angle demonstrating magnet placement afterwards
- Daily photos of the wound healing
It's probably worth saying that I'm not a surgeon so I don't intend to teach anyone how to properly disinfect for such a procedure, finger anatomy, or such. I can't show you the "correct" way to do it, I can only document how I did it and what I experienced.
I started off soaking everything in Chlorhexidine Gluconate for a good hour, and scrubbed my hands off well rinsing them with saline. I managed to get the needle in about 4mm, and had already flipped it over before the skin split. Deciding I hadn't started deep enough, and still had plenty of room left to work with I continued, going just a tad bit deeper. Once I reached about 4mm along again and the pain was becoming pretty noticeable, I also began to feel more resistance trying to push the needle further. As I continued to push I was surprised to notice I was beginning to feel a bit nauseous.
I've never considered myself a squeamish person. I've taken self aid and buddy care classes where I've been exposed to videos of actual gaping wounds. The sight of my blood or anyone else's has never bothered me before, and there was nothing of that sort here, just a needle in a finger. I guess there's something to be said about the tactile feel of pushing through your own flesh when it's offering so much resistance as the thought of the skin splitting during your first attempt is fresh in your mind. At any rate, as much as I hate to admit it, the nausea got the better of me before I managed to get the needle in far enough for me to feel confident inserting the magnet. Not only that, but it was about the time I'd gotten the needle out that I realized I had forgotten to premedicate with Ibuprofen as I'd planned.
I know I'll regret it if I leave it at this, so the only question for me is whether to try again on a different finger in the next couple days or wait longer for my ring finger to heal enough for another go.
My personal recommendation would be to give it a few days and seriously consider a different finger. If you do want to implant in the same area of the same finger, make sure it's completely healed before you introduce new trauma to the site.
Also, if you think the pain was a significant source of the anxiety you were feeling, consider doing a digital nerve block. There is absolutely no shame at all in doing it. My choice to not do it is likely foolhardy, truth be told. Check out @Cassox's blog for information on how to do it (I think he still has that up there somewhere, or search Youtube for videos). You can get the needed supplies for it from Dangerous Things (look for the pain management kit). Do keep in mind that depending on where you live, using injected lidocaine may not technically be legal.
Best of luck to you. You'll get it.
Unfortunately, I don't believe Lidocain is really an option for me, I'll have to try again without it. I think I'll have a go again tomorrow, but I'm still considering whether to do a different finger on my left hand or the ring finger on my right hand.
Things went a bit more smoothly this time, and there was no nausea at all. I remembered the Ibuprofen, and I think the motivational music I put on helped quite a bit ("Row Row Fight the Power" I can't think of anything more motivating than Gurren Lagann) Unfortunately, I was too concerned with getting it done, and forgot to take any photos/video.
My finger is throbbing a little bit right now, but to my surprise there was very little pain during the procedure this go around. The worst part was shoving the magnet in, it took quite a bit of force to make the transition from the upper layers of skin to where it needed to be underneath. I pulled the plunger out of the RFID injector, and used that to push the magnet along, I just hope I managed to get the whole thing deep enough.
I'll throw a couple comments on depth in that may (or may not?) ease your mind. If you are talking about depth as in thickness of the skin over the magnet, according to @Cassox, you only really need a millimeter or so (possibly more if you have thick callouses on your fingers). If you mean distance of the magnet from the entry wound, bear in mind that when using a scalpel insertion, typically the pocket is about 5mm, meaning the edge of the magnet is, at best, about 2mm from the entry wound. Admittedly, sutures are usually involved which makes the whole thing more secure, but with a needle insertion like you've done, you've got a far smaller entry wound which will close up faster.
As you observed, getting the magnet past that outer layer of skin is difficult when you've used an RFID injector needle because the hole is physically smaller than the magnet. The inner tissue distorts to fit the magnet far more easily. Funny how easy it is to push the magnet the rest of the way in after it clears that outer layer of skin, isn't it? A bigger needle would make it easier to get in, but as you saw, it isn't really necessary.
For the m36 magnets, I'm going to be using an 8G piercing needle, which is quite alot larger. The too-small needle works for the m31 because its only 1mm thick, so you can sort of distort the opening in the flesh that the RFID needle makes into an oval that will accommodate the magnet. The m36, though, is 3mm in its shortest dimension and so will need a larger needle. Should be interesting to do. My 8G needles should arrive tomorrow. I suspect that the RFID injector needle would be able to slide very freely with space to spare into the hollow of the 8G. Fun stuff.
Is there anything you'll change with your method due to the different placement?
No real change to the process with the exception of the larger needle. I intend to insert the needle nearer the wrist (but not at the wrist itself) and drive the needle toward the fingers (i.e. distally). I'm hoping for a full 2cm penetration of the needle just to be sure it doesn't get rejected. This is all pending some examination of the hand nerves and blood vessels, though, and could be subject to change if I don't like how the anatomy of the area looks in relation to my intended needle path.
If you find any good info on blood vessels and nerves in the entire hand would you mind posting a link here, or in a new thread?
After the first few days and bruising went down the needle path on my finger looked like a blood blister (possibly not enough pressure applied for long enough after removing tourniquet?) The blood inside had dried up so it was dark, and hard. I was worried the dried blood would get in the way of new tissue growth, but didn't want to risk causing unneccesary damage so I let it be. On the 9th day it still looked pretty much the exact same, and I decided to stop wearing band aids since there was essentially a scab filling the needle path anyway.
It wasn't long before I regretted the decision. On the exact same day I accidentally scraped my finger against a metal edge while working, and peeled the skin off over the entire needle path. Luckily I only got the upper layers of skin, and was left with a raw reddish pink patch without any bleeding. On the up side, it removed the dried blood, and I can now see that the rest of the needle's path into the deeper tissues is healing nicely despite the incident. There's only a tiny hint of the hole left filled with darker red tissue that looks somewhat... gooyer, I guess? It has a somewhat wet appearance, but after the initial wound cleaning hasn't been leaking any fluid. Needless to say, I'll be wearing band aids for a while longer anyway.
The first implant failed cause I got in to flat (so not deep enough) and I also made a too short canal.
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcrc/needlein-failure.jpg )
So the skin broke up, the canal got smaller and smaller and here I decided to gave up on this finger, thought about what I did wrong and continued with the next one.
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcag/magnetin-failure.jpg )
The next one went good; the magnet got under the skin!
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcop/magnetin.jpg )
After it was under the skin I tried to use a piece of PTFE to get it to its final position. I used PTFE cause I thought it won't scratch the coating of the magnet for sure, but it didn't work (see below).
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcll/ptfein.jpg )
For pain management I used the single-injection volar subcutaneous block as described here: http://file.scirp.org/Html/3-8202324_39554.htm - The only difference is that I used 2ml of a 1% Lidocaine application. No need to massage it in, you see how the finger swellows while injecting. These swelling goes to the sides (where the digital nerves are) pretty fast! 5 to 10 minutes after inserting the Lidocaine I didn't feel anything at my finger.
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldcic/lidoin2.jpg )
Now to the point about PTFE: Instead of pushing the magnet it just goes beside it. You never know if you're really pushing the magnet or not. Also the fingertips were swollen while operating, so I couldn't really check the magnets position at that time. Today (2 days after) I had a look:
("Higher" res: http://picload.org/image/igldipr/dsc-0163.jpg - sorry for the bad quality)
As you see it looks like I didn't move them at all! After seeing that I re-opened the middle finger (left on the last image) and tried to move the magnet with another tool and without Lidocaine - It was extreme pain and I think I just moved it 1 to 2 mm. Yes, I know I shouldn't re-open the finger and I shouldn't try to move it while it heals.
I hope the position of the magnets is still good in terms of pressure and nerve density.
In a few (min. 2) weeks I'll try the failed finger again. Any suggestions what to use to push the magnet?
Last words: The fingers are still (except at the time I re-moved the magnet in the middle finger) completely pain-free but also no magnetic sensations so far (I didn't search for them as I know it's to early to play with it).
Last images: Random photos of the procedure. Wished I had more for you and yes, more exist, I just can't get them as the photographer does... weird actions... :/
OP Area (do you see the 3 magnets? ) :
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldwai/oparea.jpg )
Always keep air out of the syringe - Even if we don't inject into blood vessels air highers the infection risk!
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldwli/lido-dontuse.jpg )
The down part of the finger is swollen cause of the Lidocaine injection:
(Higher res: http://picload.org/image/igldwlp/lidoinside.jpg )
Personally, I opted to start out closer to the joint so as to get a longer needle path than you did. The further it is from the opening in the flesh, the less likely it is to get pushed out as it heals, or so it seems to me anyway. Less tissue damage, though, if you go shorter, so if it works out, cool.
It looks in the pictures like you did not use a tourniquet, which will hamper this method, but if you shine a bright light through the finger, you can physically see where the magnet is sitting, at least if you've gotten most of the blood out of it first. Also, using another neodymium magnet outside the finger, you should be able to both tell where the magnet currently is while working AND use it to assist in pulling the magnet to the correct position.
I had no issues with my fork tine taper going beside the magnet as I pushed the magnet in. Maybe the diameter of your piece of PTFE is too small? A taper nearly the size of the pierced hole in the tissue would ensure you are hitting the magnet no matter what. And I don't know how rigid the PTFE is, but with the fork tine, I could clearly feel when I tapped it onto the magnet (i.e. tapping something hard feels very different than tapping something soft). I was able, each time, to just insert my "taper", feel that it was hitting the magnet, and push. I just pushed it until it bottomed out in the needle canal, then pushed a little more for good measure (painful, though, but I wasn't numbed at all).
Hopefully the ones you've got in end up being all good. Personally, I'd probably wait a little longer then two weeks for the redo if you're targeting the same position on the finger, but depending on how fast you heal, you may feel good to go after two weeks.
At any rate, congrats regardless, and best of luck!
Yea, I opted for less tissue damage. With a scalpel they are making just a 5 mm canal IIRC, so I thought my canal should be long enough.
I used a hair tie as tourniquet, you see it on the picture with the piece of PTFE. Anyway, no matter how tight I tried to get it (I used one of my tools to get if even tighter that I was able with bare hands alone) it still bleeded, the bleeding just reduced. I think this is caused by the swelling of the Lidocaine (which is also why I didn't try to get the blood out of the finger; I thought I could move the Lidocaine with it which could be bad). I tried using a needle, a surgical blade as well as another m31 to check the position but even the other m31 wasn't strong enough, I could move the other m31 around 5 mm and it would still stick to the finger, so all I was able so say was that the magnet is inside of the canal but not where exactly. I tried to move it with the other m31, too, but I don't think it worked.
I think you're right and my needle was too small, I even used a surgical blade to cut the incision point around 0,5 to 1 mm more before I could get the magnet inside (and even then a lot of force was needed). Sorry, english isn't my native language and I'm pretty sure you don't need a candle with "taper". Do you mean something like that?
I hope they're good, too. Shortly after writing here I got my first two magnetic sensations; my PC monitor has some (I guess) static fields, they're almost not detectable, and my microwave, well, you know that feeling. :) I'm not sure when I'll retry again, min. 2 weeks was just a rounded guess, cause as you said it depends on the healing process (I'm wearing nothing more than a small plaster over that finger, cause what isn't in can't be rejected and that way I have one more finger for daily tasks. On the other side the lesser protection + using it for daily tasks might slow down the healing).
Thanks, also thanks for all your helpful talking. :)
You are probably right about pushing the blood out of the finger when using lidocaine. Even if nothing bad happens, it would still likely reduce the lidocaine's effectiveness.
The magnet I used outside the finger was larger than the m31. I do not know the strength, but it was approximately 1cm in diameter and 2-3mm thick.
The taper is the equivalent of your piece of PTFE. In my case, it was the tine of a plastic fork (one of the points of a plastic fork).
Congrats on getting your first sensation, by the way.
@FrankMatheson So there's no problem with micro-damaging the tissue / pushing the lidocaine into the hand? If that's true I'll definitely try it next time. :)
got it in there, you should be triple anti-bacing and keeping it
wrapped for AT LEAST 2 weeks if not longer. Feel free to read the post
op care page on the wiki. This goes as a warning to everyone else. Keep
your shit wrapped so it can heal. "
That's how both my m31's rejected. constantly keeping triple-bac on the implant site every day kept the implant site wet and you want to keep the location clean and dry for it to heal properly.
In fact there should even be powders available which might be much better than a gel. I mean this powders are designed for wet wounds but a little bit of sweating (below the bandage) or wound fluid (from a broken scab) should activate it, too, and it might even have a way longer anti-bac effect this way.