Does It Hurt to Get Stitches?
Key takeaways:
Administering stitches, also known as sutures, is a common medical procedure used to close wounds and promote healing.
Stitches are typically used to hold together larger, more severe wounds.
While getting stitches can be uncomfortable, most people can tolerate it with the help of anesthetics. Here’s how three people describe what getting stitches feels like.
You can’t get through life without a few bumps and scrapes. But some of those scrapes are more serious than others.
While most wounds heal on their own, some wounds need help from stitches to heal properly.
Stitches are commonly used on severe cuts to hold the tissue together as the wound heals.
Depending on the size and location of the wound, the process of getting stitches can be uncomfortable. But with the help of a local anesthetic that’s applied before the suturing, most people can tolerate it.
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Here’s how three people describe what it’s like to get stitches and whether it hurts.
The case of the jaggedy planter
In 2019, Nathan Kraxberger was packing up his car for a family camping trip in upstate New York when an unexpected cut put the trip on hold. While the injury wasn’t severe, it was still a shock to him and his kids.
“I was bleeding all over the place on the street right outside my house as my kids were watching me, and I was thinking, ‘What am I going to do?’” says Nathan, a 50-year-old photographer who lives in Brooklyn, New York.
As he was packing the car, his leg got caught on a jagged piece of metal protruding from a planter box nearby. The cut, which ran up his upper right calf, was 3 inches deep and rough.
“I couldn’t pull my leg off the planter box at first,” he says. “The cut was so deep, and I instantly knew this was a problem and needed more than a Band-Aid.”
Nathan applied pressure to the wound and cleaned it with napkins from a nearby ice cream truck. He went to the nearest urgent care clinic, and the doctor sewed him up with dissolvable stitches.
“I was surprised how little getting the stitches hurt,” Nathan says. “What hurt the most was the day after when the wound was inflamed.”
How do I know if I need stitches? It depends on the size, severity, and location of the wound.
How do you stop a cut from bleeding? Use clean hands and a clean cloth to apply firm pressure. If first aid doesn’t work, seek professional help.
How do I know if a wound is healing or infected? Wounds should get better over time. A red, warm, painful, or foul-smelling wound may be infected.
After he got stitches, Nathan and his family went on the camping trip. He says he kept the wound clean and was able to do all the activities he normally would.
‘Whatever I stepped on in the water felt like a Lego’
In 2022, Sam Lopane was backpacking in the Indian Peaks Wilderness in Colorado. He and his group had finished their trail a day earlier than they expected and decided to celebrate.
“As we were walking, we noticed we were close to the campsite, and I saw a lake nearby and was so excited to be done, I rushed to jump in the lake,” Sam remembers.
But the refreshing dip in the water also led him to step on something unexpected.
“Whatever I stepped on in the water felt like a Lego,” he says. “It didn’t feel sharp, but as I was coming out of the water, I could tell my foot was bleeding.”
Sam and his wife weren’t sure if he needed stitches.
“By the time I got back to the car and wrapped my foot, it was very painful,” Sam says, explaining he and his wife FaceTimed a nurse friend who recommended they go to urgent care for stitches.
They drove the 30 miles back to Denver and arrived at the urgent care clinic with Sam still bleeding and holding a wet T-shirt around his foot. He received 8 stitches, which he says were more painful than the ones he remembers getting as a kid.
“My foot was really sore and inflamed for a week,” Sam says, adding that it was probably because the cut was on a sensitive part of the foot.
Despite the hiking trip ending with an injury, Sam, a 29-year-old food scientist who lives in Brooklyn, looks back on it as a funny experience. Thinking of it reminds him of the time when his excitement to finish a hike got the best of him.
Surgically removing a skin condition
Recalling her experience getting stitches back in high school, Ann Garg jokes: “It was a fun time, from what I remember.”
For Ann, sarcasm is the best medicine when facing a health issue like the one that led to her getting stitches.
When Ann was a junior in high school, she got diagnosed with nevus comedonicus, a rare skin condition. The condition typically looks like a honeycomb of blackheads on the skin. And for Ann, it would cause her abdomen to become irritated in the summer months when she would sweat more.
Her dermatologist recommended an extraction procedure to remove the bumps and stitches to mend the wound.
“It was my first surgery of my life, and at 16 I had no idea what to expect,” says Ann, who is now 29 and living in Charlotte, North Carolina. “I was awake, and they had to numb the area. But the stitches they put in didn’t hurt much.”
The uncomfortable part, she says, was bending over and putting pressure on the stitches after the procedure. But after about 3 weeks, the dissolvable stitches disappeared, and her wound healed. Best of all, she says, her skin condition did not come back.
What does the doctor say?
Patricia Pinto-Garcia, MD, MPH
Senior Medical Editor
Stitches, or sutures, can help wounds heal faster and lower your risk of infection and large scars. Many people get stitches after an accidental injury, but sutures are also used to close surgical wounds.
Luckily, getting sutures isn’t very painful. Local anesthesia numbs the tissues around the wound, which makes the entire process very similar to getting a cavity filled at the dentist. You might feel some tugging and pressure, but you won’t feel any sharp pain. And now that topical anesthetics — like creams and gels — are more widely available, you won’t feel the pinch and burn of the needle that delivers the local anesthesia, either.
The stitches themselves shouldn’t hurt while your wound heals. But it is normal to experience symptoms around the wound, such as:
Itching
Burning
Redness
Mild swelling
Mild discomfort
Warmth
These are signs of inflammation, which is a normal part of wound healing. Inflammation isn’t caused by the sutures but by your body working to heal your injury.
Any signs of inflammation you experience should be mild. More serious symptoms — like fever, pus, or significant pain and swelling — may indicate an infection. You should seek medical care right away if you develop serious symptoms. It’s also a good idea to get your wound checked within a few days after getting stitches to make sure your wound is healing well.
Getting stitches removed isn’t painful, but you may feel pressure and tugging as the stitches are cut and pulled out of your skin. Some stitches are dissolvable, meaning they disintegrate on their own. But most stitches need to be removed within 3 to 14 days. If you don’t get them removed in time, healthy tissue will start to grow around the sutures, and your body will attack them, causing granulation tissue to form. While this isn’t dangerous, it can make it harder to remove the sutures and can worsen scarring.
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