I am a little confused and don't want to call the doctor for something so minor. I had one person tell me at the hospital that I could take off the Steri-strips in 2 weeks--and one person tell me to leave them alone they will fall off! Neither of these people was the sugeon--he told me nothing lol. What do you think I should do?? It's been 2 1/2 weeks and they are still pretty stuck on there. Should I take them off?? Won't they rip off the scabs??

Do you have a post op visit with your Doc soon? Ideally he or she would have told you what to do. lol, oh well. It should be fine to remove them as long as the edges of your wounds have healed together. It's actually the internal sutures and likely dermabond holding your incisions together. After you have a warm shower they should peel off fairly easily (be gentle). Good luck:)

Hi, I have had a few surgeries and they usually come off in a couple of days. I never take them off they come of on thier own.

I was told to leave them on! they were really strong on that. They said if they start to hang or curl up to cut the edges off

I didn't have them for my lapband surgery, but in the past, I've always been told to leave them on. I was told that as your skin heals, it will let go of the strips.

I was told that they should fall off in 7 to 14 days and if they had not fallen off in 14 days then i could take them off. I actually took them off in 12 days b/c i was curious and they were fine!

My steristrips stayed on for 2 whole weeks and when I went to the doctor the nurse said "I dont know why they tell you not to take these things off before 2 weeks...they harbor so much bacteria!" and they pulled them off and I was healed.

I had one nurse tell me to leave them on until they fall off and the other to tell me when they start peeling up at the edges to go ahead and take them off.

At my post op appt the LPN told me to leave them on for the full 2 weeks. She said patients who left them on till then had less scaring and the strips helped with that. So I've just been clipping the edges, tues will be 2 wks so I'll take them all off then. Besides, any longer than that I would imagine that could get unsanitary don't you think?

Mine told me they'd fall off on their own, so as the edges curled, I just trimmed them off. Three weeks post op I pulled them off because the only part still sticking was directly on the incision.

As for less scarring, I'm amazed at how little scarring and how my scar is disappearing.