If you are planning a Mohs surgical procedure, you’ll need to know a bit about the recovery process! Mohs surgery recovery can range from quick and simple to long and difficult— it all depends on how much tissue was removed during your surgery.
Most patients are completely recovered within 6-8 weeks, but more elaborate removals with grafts can take longer to heal properly. We all want to bounce back and get back into action after surgery, but it’s important to give our bodies enough time to heal; here are five tips for your Mohs surgery recovery.
1 - Limit Physical Activity After Mohs Surgery
Surgery is hard on the body, even if there was no internal cutting or sutures. Your body will be recovering for several weeks, and much of your daily energy will go towards tissue regeneration and the healing process. You can help your body heal faster by limiting physical activity on a daily basis to things like slow walking and slow stretches (that don’t involve the area where you had surgery).
2 - Avoid Tugging and Stretching
When it comes to the surgical site itself, you should avoid any tugging or stretching that could cause your wound to open. Your surgeon will likely use sutures of some kind— either dissolving or standard surgical thread. Regardless of the type of sutures used to close your wound, you should take care to let your body work through the normal healing process; tugging and stretching can cause your incision to develop more scar tissue than it would otherwise.
3 - Don’t Itch Or Scratch
Some itchiness is expected and normal after surgery as the wound begins to heal. Unfortunately, scratching can cause serious damage to the new scar tissue that is forming between the outer edges of your incision. If you want your healed surgical site to look as good as possible when it heals, try placing a bandage over the site, so that you’re less tempted, and don’t scratch!
4 - Follow Your Mohs Surgery Recovery Instructions
As with any surgical procedure, you will be sent home with a list of detailed recovery instructions. Mohs surgery is an invasive procedure that will leave you with an incision that can range from small to quite large with grafting. In order to heal as quickly and efficiently as possible, you should follow your surgeon’s instructions as closely as possible. If you notice any issues with your incision site, contact your surgeon’s office immediately.
5 - Pick a Great Mohs Scar Cream
Perhaps the most critical part of your Mohs surgery recovery will be keeping your incision clean and dry during the first week or so. After that point, your doctor will likely recommend that you moisturize the incision in order to keep the scarring under control. If your Mohs surgery was in a highly visible location like your face, we recommend that you use Rejuvasil to help minimize scarring and preserve an even skin tone. A product like Scar FX Silicone Sheeting would be a good solution for the less visible spots on your body.