The pressure bandage around Sam Carmichael’s right thigh is the only indication that he’s suffered any kind of injury.
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Yet it’s only about seven weeks since the 15-year-old fell off his motorbike while riding on his family’s property near Coolamon and badly burned his leg on the exhaust.
The result was a deep dermal burn, about 15 centimetres long and up to seven centimetres wide.
“I’m still not sure what happened. But I was riding on a sheep track and I came off,” Sam said.
He got himself back to the house and showed his dad Andrew, prompting the family to start first aid procedures before mum Kylie took Sam to Wagga Base Hospital.
“It really didn’t hurt that much at the time,” he said.
“But Dad looked at it and said ‘I think you’re going to have to go to hospital’.
“He was right.”
Emergency dashes to hospital are actually nothing new to Sam, who has a history of asthma and allergies as well as his fair share of childhood scrapes, but he still was not particularly keen on another visit.
In Wagga Base Hospital’s emergency department, Sam’s burn was treated and dressed and staff initially flagged the possibility of him needing a skin graft.
But that eventually proved not to be necessary, Mrs Carmichael said.
The strong relationship and treatment procedures shared by Wagga Base Hospital paediatric staff and Westmead Children’s Hospital means Sam was able to avoid what once would have been an emergency flight to Sydney and a lengthy, recovery there.
Sam reckons his recovery has been straightforward, even with regular trips between the farm and Wagga Base Hospital for dressing changes and check-ups.
The only time he encountered any pain was when he thought he see how he went playing a bit of touch footy, just a day after burning himself.
“Yeah, that got a bit narly,” he said.
But the sporting setbacks were short lived and Sam is already back on the field with the Farrer League’s Northern Jets under 15s.
As his wound is healing, Sam is beginning physiotherapy, which will continue for some months to help minimise scarring, along with wearing the pressure bandage.
But the experience has not kept Sam from getting back on the motorcycle.
He has put it down to one of those things, much like the time he slammed his hand in the tractor door and took off the very top of one fingertip.
Winter is, unfortunately, the season for burns.
Carol Cattell, a registered nurse, says it is when Wagga Base Hospital will start to see more children who have touched a heater or open fire, been burned by a barbecue or spilled hot drinks or two-minute noodles down their fronts.
Ms Cattell works with the Murrumbidgee Local Health District’s paediatric Hospital in the Home service, and providing follow-up care to children with burns is part of her job.
Both Ms Cattell and colleague Sonia Wainwright say there has been enormous improvement in the way burns are treated.
One of the most obvious, Ms Cattell said, is the development of better dressings for wounds.
"Years ago, you had to change burns dressings every day and it was horrible. There was so much pain and discomfort,” she said.
“But now, we may not need to change them for between three and seven days.
“Children can be at home while they are healing, they can go to school.”
There is less pain, less risk of infections and less trauma, Ms Wainwright said.
The other big improvement has been the development of a close relationship between staff at Wagga and those at the Westmead Children’s Hospital, meaning patients can indeed be treated from home, and the demand for beds in Sydney is reduced.
Wagga staff use digital technology to get additional advice from their counterparts at Westmead’s burns and plastic treatment centre.
This gives local nurses, physiotherapists and occupational therapists the opportunity to enhance their skills in paediatric burn and scar management.
There are currently plans to expand the treatment program to Griffith Base Hospital, where staff are undergoing additional training.