How long can you have an abscess before you know it

[cleuger]

I am recovering from an abdominal abscess surgery and was wondering how a long a person can have one before they know they have it? For instance could someone have an abdominal abscess for a month and not know it?
And how long do these thing drain for? I thought it was done draning then all the suddon it started draning a lot then slowed back down.



TIA

 

[Sailorluna]

I have never had an abdominal one but I would guess that like the rectal ones each is unique. I had one drained in April and the surgeon thinks it may have started in November and just was not spotted when they checked - they assumed my issues were from a smaller one elsewhere. At the time they hit me with IV antibiotics and drained the little one - it was months before if started bugging me again. I had no idea there was a second one.

How long it will drain depends on how well they drained it / cleaned it up in the first place. If it does not stop draining you could have a fistula.

 

[eastcoast]

I'm currently having an abdominal abscess drained. I've had the drain in for four weeks as of tomorrow. For the first two or three days it drained quite a bit of brown and then yellow material. A week after I got the drain it started spurting out bits of blood/fleshy looking material, and then nothing for a day. But, then it started back up with more yellow stuff and it hasnt stopped for about 2 weeks now. My doctor admitted me to the hospital again and now its back to brown. Very frustrating process! I'm pretty sure I had the abscess a few weeks before it was drained. It was very painful, swollen and red on the skin. My docotor said that if I developed any sort of fever to go to the er right away to avoid septic shock.