The common errors made in treating facial wounds at this stage are failure to remove all dirt from the wound, creation of a scar with gross suture marks, and failure to suture the various wound edges in the precise position which they occupied relative to one another before the in}ury. The effect of failure to remove all dirt from the wound is to leave foci of tattooed scarring in the dermis.
These are always difficult, and often impossible, to eradicate completely later once healing has taken place. Suture marks along the line of a scar result from the use of coarse suture material and/or failure to remove sutures sufficiently early, allowing the sutures to cut into the tissues. The coarser the suture material the broader and more obtrusive is the linear scar which it creates. Such marks are virtu-ally impossible to eradicate subsequently.
Failure to suture the wound margins in the position which they occupied prior to the injury leaves irregularities, which are especially obvi-ous when the lip margin, eyelid, eyebrow or nostril have been imperfectly matched.