Why is it that I have scars that have lasted since childhood that were caused by totally insignificant injuries, yet when I get really bad injuries now, the scars fade super fast? I thought it was safe to assume that worse injury = worse scar
In: Other
Sunlight exposure can affect a scar to some degree. When you were a kid you might have played outside a lot more and the UV damage got to it. As an adult you might have been a little more careful in keeping it covered.
Children typically have a faster rate of collagen production because they are younger and still growing. Their cells multiply faster, so the scars come out thicker and stay longer. Adults don’t typically have this “advantage”, as their cells have since slowed down, making scars less fortified.
So I don’t have any sources and I might be talking out of my ass but I once read that wounds that tear naturally heal better than cuts because the tissue tears where it has been weak already and therefore less tissue has to be reconstructed. It’s probably multiple factors but that could be one of them.
When the body makes scar tissue, it doesn’t include hair follicles or pores. And then once the scar tissue is there, the body never replaces it with ordinary skin.
I’ll add to the other factors, the way a wound heals has a lot to do with the scar it leaves. On both of my index fingers, along the inner side, I have nearly identical hatchet wounds that were made about a week apart and, at the time each was afflicted, were nearly identical in severity. But the first wound I didn’t have proper tending supplies i.e. antiseptic creme, bandaid, etc. I had to makeshift a bandage using paper towel and rubber bands. A day or two later I got the proper supplies. So the time the second wound occurred I had all the supplies ready and could tend it properly from the start. The difference in scar is significant.
A scar is just your body replacing the cells that were destroyed in the injury. Unfortunately, they don’t create an exact replica of the skin that was there before, they just create a new layer of let’s say, generic skin to cover the exposed area.
Latest Answers