Robert Whitfield MD explains when to remove surgical drains after breast surgery. Drains come out when output drops below 30 cc per 24 hours, usually by post-op day 3 or 4. Overweight patients and large surgical spaces tend to drain longer, but most come out within a week.
Questions this video answers
Less than 30 cc per 24 hours per breast.
Between post-operative day 3 and day 4 if output criteria met.
About one week (they avoid going past a week).
Chapters
Now maybe we should talk about something else that gets a lot of attention is kind of draining people and how to manage that and what's your, what's your philosophy or thoughts about draining and how to get that sorted out for patients? Because you have a lot of patients travel in as I do.
Yes. So I do drain. So I do drain in the capsular space because I want that space to close. If I do do a breast lift, I also drain the area between the muscle and the breast. So I put in. So if I'm doing a capsulectomy under the muscle and a breast lift, I do drain. I do. I put in a JP for the capsular space under the muscle and I put in an axiom Y drain for above the muscle. And so in those situations, they have to be less than 30ccs per 24 hours per breath for me to take out those drains. Typically the people, typically we can take out the drain and fulfill that criteria between day three and day four of the post op. People who are a little bit overweight, who have a big space, who have a rupture, they tend to take longer. But what I tell them is that, you know, the drain does detox you because there's a gradient of chemicals that extend from your capsule to the rest to the, to the surrounding space. So if you're draining that, and that would include both fat soluble and water soluble liquid. So I tell them, you know, if you're still draining a lot, that means that you're, that, that is good because we're detoxing. So those people, they stay longer or they go home and they come back or they just stay until the drains are out. And I don't want to go past a week. So some, you know, I just take them out even though they don't fulfill the criteria.
