What Does Slough Mean In Medical Terms?

dead tissue separating.
: dead tissue separating from living tissue. especially : a mass of dead tissue separating from an ulcer. slough.

What does a slough mean?

biology. (of some animals) to have a layer of skin come off: Snakes slough their skin regularly. Synonyms. molt US.

How do you slough off?

If you slough something off, you treat it as unimportant or do not take it seriously: Politicians sloughed off the issue.

What is a synonym for slough?

Some common synonyms of slough are cast, discard, junk, scrap, and shed.

What is a slow slough?

A slough (/sluː/ ( listen) or /slaʊ/ ( listen)) is a wetland, usually a swamp or shallow lake, often a backwater to a larger body of water. Water tends to be stagnant or may flow slowly on a seasonal basis.

Does slough indicate healing?

Slough is considered the by-product of the inflammatory phase of wound healing. An essential component of wound bed preparation is the removal of slough from a wound bed. Slough not only contributes to delayed wound healing, it also prevents an accurate wound assessment and can also harbour biofilms.

Does slough mean infection?

If what you’re cleansing out of the wound is stringy and yellow, and the wound base appears more granular after cleansing, it is most likely slough. If there is an odor, erythema, and signs and symptoms of infection, you’re most likely dealing with purulence or purulent drainage.

What can I put on a Sloughy wound?

There are dressings specifically designed to promote autolytic debridement, which include thin films, honey, alginates, hydrocolloids, and PMDs. Hydrogels and hydrocolloids are additional dressing choices that may be effective in removing slough. Figure 4.

Is Slough pus?

Slough is made up of white blood cells, bacteria and debris, as well as dead tissue, and is easily confused with pus, which is often present in an infected wound (Figs 3 and 4).

How long does it take for skin to slough off?

Where do all of those dead skin cells go? You might be surprised to know that most of the dust in your home is actually made up of dead skin cells. The entire desquamation process, from cell birth to sloughing away, takes approximately 14 to 28 days.

What is a slough and why is it important?

A slough is a swamp or shallow lake system, usually a backwater to a larger body of water. South Slough is a 4,771-acre National Estuarine Research Reserve located on Coos Bay Estuary in Oregon (Image credit: South Slough NERR). A slough is typically used to describe wetlands.

Why is it called slough?

The origin of the name is not clear. It may have derived from Slow. This was the name of open land in that part of the parish called ‘The Slow Field’, an area distinct from ‘Upton Field’. Verbal evidence documented later referred to the abundance of sloe-bushes in the area.

What are the characteristics of a slough?

A slough is a wetland which is characterized by slow-moving or stagnant water on a seasonal basis. The term slough is used to describe wetlands like shallow lakes and swamps. A slough is a natural side-channel or an inlet filled with water.

What is human slough?

: dead tissue separating from living tissue especially : a mass of dead tissue separating from an ulcer. slough. intransitive verb. Medical Definition of slough (Entry 2 of 2) : to separate in the form of dead tissue from living tissue dermal sloughing.

What makes a body of water a slough?

Sloughs (pronounced “slews”) are shallow lakes or swamps. Generally they serve as backwaters – or a stagnant part of a river – and are consequently located at edges of rivers where a stream or other canal once flowed.

What is the best dressing to remove Slough?

AIM: Remove slough and absorb exudate. Use hydroactive dressings, or alginate dressings covered by a foam dressing. Primary dressing examples: alginate; hydrofiber; or hydroactive. Secondary dressing examples: high absorbent non-adherent dressing; or foam.

What does slough tissue look like?

Slough is defined as yellow devitalized tissue, that can be stringy or thick and adherent on the tissue bed. This wound bed has both yellow stringy slough as well as thick adherent slough. Slough on a wound bed should be surgically debrided to allow for ingrowth of healthy granulation tissue.

Can you stage a wound with Slough?

Full thickness tissue loss in which the base of the ulcer is covered by slough (yellow, tan, gray, green or brown) and/ or eschar (tan, brown or black) in the wound bed. Until enough slough and/or eschar is removed to expose the base of the wound, the true depth, and therefore stage, cannot be determined.

Does hydrogen peroxide remove Slough?

Hydrogen peroxide generally has the ability to kill off the unviable tissue which can then be easily removed as soft necrotic slough.

Does Slough need debridement?

In those wounds that contain only slough, high-risk debridement methods are not considered necessary for its removal. The use of mechanical techniques for removing the slough is regarded as posing a much lower risk to the patient and the wound bed.

Should you Debride Slough?

Slough is marked by its color, which can be yellow, tan, gray, green, or brown. It can be stringy and loose or thick and adherent to the wound bed. It is imperative that slough be debrided to kick-start the healing process and allow for the ingrowth of healthy granulation tissue.