How to Treat a Pilonidal Cyst

Do you think that you might have a Pilonidal Cyst? Well, if you have a knot in your tailbone area, you could very well have a Pilonidal Cyst. According to emedicinehealth.com, a Pilonidal Cyst is an abscess that results from hair and dirt that work its way into your skin. It earned the name Jeep Disease because an usually large amount of soldiers suffered from Pilonidal Cysts due to riding around in jeeps all day, according to emedicinehealth.com.

Some Pilonidal Cysts fail to cause trouble for awhile, but some cause trouble immediately. If you have pain and inflammation in your tailbone area, you need to get medical attention for your Pilonidal Cyst because it will not get better on its own, and it needs to be drained. You can try heat and hope that this boil-like abscess will form a head, but it probably won't. Even if it does, it will likely abscess again because the hair needs to be cleared out of the hole.

Your best option is to go ahead and visit your family doctor to get your Pilonidal Cyst lanced. Don't go into your doctor's office expecting him/her to prescribe you antibiotics as an alternate treatment because antibiotics will not make a Pilonidal Cyst better. Most likely, your doctor will cut open the abscess and let the infection drain from the hole. Your doctor will then clear out the hair and any dirt that might be in there. This way, the hole can heal.

Your doctor might decide to pack the hole with gauze to help soak up the infection. This means that you will have to change the gauze at home, and this can be a pain, not to mention that the smell of the infection drainage is less than pleasant. Your doctor might also choose to sew the hole open, much like a doctor treats a fistula. This would keep the Pilonidal Cyst from coming back because it takes away the hole that the hair and dirt gathered in to form the Pilonidal Cyst.

Your doctor might take a more traditional approach and just drain the Pilonidal Cyst and then choose to close the hole up. This prompts quicker healing, but the closed hole does provide opportunity for the Pilonidal Cyst to come back because the doctor might not have been able to clean out all the hair and dirt. So, if your doctor chooses the less convenient option of packing the hole or sewing it open, don't complain. The doctor is just trying to keep the Pilonidal Cyst from re-appearing.

Sources

emedicinehealth.com