Ever Have A Boil?

Treating a Boil at home There is plenty of basic info on the web that can be found upon googling it. Don't lance it Remember what a boil is. I had visions of a neatly contained sack of puss under perfectly healthy skin. Just one little prick, and the whole lot would come exploding out and I would feel oh so much better! But this is not what a boil is or how it behaves. A boil is an unholy mess of puss and flesh. The body is very capable of healing itself, the boil will come to a head naturally, burst and drain. One can speed this up a bit with the compress, but trying to lance it yourself won't help at all. Remember, squeezing pushes the puss deeper, which is not what you want. You simply cannot afford to do a half arsed job, you have to cut deeply into the boil with your knife. Way too painful. At most you will scratch the surface which won't accomplish anything except breaking the skin, giving chance for more infection to get in. Professionals know when it is the right time to lance, they have anaesthetic to numb the pain, and the skill to get right in there and clean out most of the gunk. So it should be seen! Good luck with this.

A lot would depend on what part of the body your friend has the boil. I had one on my wrist when I was a child and the pain was really bad. My mum used to bathe it every morning and evening in water as hot as I could bare it. Then she would soak some white bread in hot water and wrap it in a light piece of cloth and place it over the boil. Within a couple of days the boil had burst and it could then be lanced. If your friend doesn't want to go to the doctor, then he could visit his pharmacist and ask for some over the counter rememdy. Keep us informed how things go.