Overview

A surgical drain is a plastic tube that carries fluid from inside your body to a bottle outside of your body.

The bottle is clear so you can see the colour of the fluid that collects inside and measure it every day. The amount of fluid that collects each day tells us when it’s safe to remove your drain.

Depending on what type of surgery you had, you might need to keep the drain in for between 5 days and 8 weeks.

You might leave hospital with the drain and take care of it yourself until we can remove it. We’ll make sure you know what to do before you leave hospital.

Benefits of having a drain

You might need a drain after having some plastic surgery procedures. This includes groin lymph node clearance, axillary lymph node clearance or breast reconstruction.

After these surgeries, your body will produce extra fluid. The drain helps to remove this fluid. If we do not drain the fluid, it might cause swelling and lead to other problems.

Draining the fluid will:

• help your wound to heal
• reduce any pain and discomfort caused by fluid collecting under your skin
• reduce the risk of infection
• reduce bruising

Risks of having a drain

Like with all procedures and treatments, having a drain comes with some risks. Our team of experts will reduce these risks as much as possible.

These risks include:

• pain and discomfort
• infection around the wound where the tube enters your body – this is more likely to happen if the drain is left in for too long
• fluid collecting under your skin (seroma) – this can happen if the drain does not work properly or if the drain is removed too early
• tissue growing around the tube – this is rare, but it can happen if you’ve had the drain in for a while

Your surgeon or nurse will discuss all the risks with you. Please talk to us if you have any questions or concerns.

How surgical drains work

The type of drain we use is called a Redivac drain.

Suction drainage

In a Redivac drain, the air inside the drainage bottle has been removed to create a vacuum. The vacuum creates gentle suction that draws the fluid from your body into the bottle. This is also called active drainage.

Passive drainage

If the bottle loses its vacuum and suction, it can still remove fluid by using passive drainage. When the drainage bottle is positioned lower than where the tube enters your body, gravity will pull the fluid from your body down to the bottle.

Who can leave hospital with a drain

You can leave hospital with a drain if:

• we have shown you how to measure the fluid in your drainage bottle and how to change the drainage bottle
• you know how to check for signs of infection
• we’ve given you spare drainage bottles and extra wound dressings
• you can organise your own transport to and from hospital – this is because you might need to come back to hospital at short notice if you have any problems with the drain
• you can come to the plastic surgery dressing clinic for regular check-ups