Umbilical cord

[MidLine]

Hi,
Just wondering if anyone had any experience/advice on this;

I have a 4 week old baby girl. Her cord clip and stump came off on day 4 which I know is a little early but it seemed clean and to be starting to heal and mw and Hv were happy with it. However over the last two weeks the area has started producing a sticky browny/greeny substance that crusts and then falls off to reveal more but area is not red or smelly. I showed the Hv who said bathe with cooled boiled water (which always seems counterproductive to me for an area you want to dry out and heal??) and keep an eye on it for redness etc.

So a week on and area still producing the discharge so I've taken her to the GP this morning who said it could be a little infected but didn't want to give her antibiotics....she said don't bathe and again keep an eye out for redness and come back on Friday if it's worse, but cancel appointment if it stays the same. I then asked when I could expect it to heal which was met with a shrug....so I just feel a bit in limbo. Anyone had a similar experience?

no, sorry - but most wounds heal better if kept clean and moist!
drying out can actually make it worse (and water pulls oils out of skin thus drying it out!) - think of scabs drying and falling off take forever to heal, yet little wounds in the mouth heal faster as always wet!

I'd keep it clean then apply vaselin to moisturize and protect wound

you could ask gp to take a swab - they grow a culture from it so you'll know what you are dealing with and can get some treatment hopefully

My son had a weepy tummy button problem. Eventually he had antibiotic cream.

I took my 3week old ds to the doctors for something else but mentioned his belly button (which sounds just as you describe) and she said it's too early to treat it, to bring him back at 6 weeks if it still the same and she will prescribe silver nitrate powder to sprinkle on. Interestingly, my mom said that she was sent home from the hospital with this powder when I was born......
HTH

Thanks for your replies. I actually got a second opinion after my trip to the GP as I wasn't really happy with her response to any of the things I asked her about, and was advised to just simply put some gauze over the umbilicus to stop the scab from being knocked off all the time which I did and thankfully since then, no more discharge! Maybe it just needed a certain amount of time undisturbed to heal? Worth a try priscilla101?

Definitely worth a try....poor little mites, eh? Thanks for the tip!