Splinter remedies

[Funnyface1]

Posting here for traffic.

Ds (8) came home from school yesterday with a splinter in the back of his thigh. He'd been wearing shorts and sat on a wooden outdoor bench at school. He didn't know it was a splinter, just complained of pain so we thought it was just a bruise and didn't find it until bedtime.

Tried to tweezer it out but it's so deep. I can see it under his skin but the end of it isn't visible to grab hold of at all. We were just hurting him so put sudocrem on for bed and left it.

Going to have a bath now and give it a soak but it's just so deep I don't know how to try and get it out without really hurting him.

Any brilliant ideas would be most welcome, thank you.

Wet cotton wool on it for ages before and in between tweezing to help draw it out. Use TCP if you have some.

I've seen someone use a calpol syringe before. Put the hole over the splinter and make a seal all round the finger. Then pull the plunger out and in theory it sucks out the splinter. There's YouTube videos on it but I haven't ever tried it myself

No easy way. You could try magnesium sulphate paste but that needs the end exposed to draw a splinter out. A bath and then make an opening for it to work its way out with a sterilised needle may be the least painful way unfortunately.

Bacon fat. Sounds ridiculous but has worked twice here since someone recommended it to me. Put bacon fat (I just cut rind off rashers) over area of splinter, bandage/wrap to keep in place. Few hours it should be poking out of skin enough to tweeze.

A warm glass over the area will draw it out if the calpol syringe is too small

Second the calpol syringe providing you’ve got one of course. Worked for my DD when she had a splinter.

Put savlon on the area with a plaster over it. Leave for a lottle while. For some reason it draws it out enough to be able to tweeze easily.

You can make a paste out of bicarbonate of soda and water. Put a plaster on and leave overnight. May help draw it out.

I second magnesium sulphate paste - I didn't realise that the end had to be visible as I'm sure it’s worked for my son when it hasn’t been. Poor him - they are horrible.

I read somewhere that putting mango (or papaya?) on the area helps. The enzymes in it break the skin down slightly making the splinter easier to pull out

Absolutely yes to the Calpol syringe...it actually does work! We were talking about it at work, then I actually managed to get a splinter so we tried it...brilliant!

Magnesium sulphate paste (from a pharmacy) works to draw the splinter to the surface and is therefore easier to remove. Sometimes it even just kind of comes out on its own - smother the area in paste and put a plaster on overnight. When you take the plaster off the splinter may very well come out as you pull it off. If not, it should be possible to tweezer it out fairly easily.
It does not need to have an end exposed to work.

Thank you for all your suggestions. We're going on holiday in the morning, up for the airport in the early hours and really want to deal with it before then. Between packing and organising everything it's a bit chaotic but I'll start with the Calpol syringe and go from there.