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TO THE EDITOR: In the article, "Splinter Removal,"1 Drs. Chan and Salam advocate rather extensive surgical exposure to remove all splinters. While I am not an expert on splinter removal, I have removed hundreds of them during my 20-year medical career. My practice has been simply to expose the end of the splinter and pull it out in the direction in which it entered. I cannot remember a single case in which I later found that a fragment had been retained. I wonder what evidence the authors have for recommending such extensive surgical exposure for removing splinters. Their suggested technique seems unnecessarily invasive.
While on the subject of splinter removal, I would also like to share the following two practice pearls concerning splinters: (1) Mammography is the ideal soft tissue imaging technique to show a radiolucent splinter. This technique has worked nicely for me on multiple occasions; and (2) a No-scalpel dissecting forceps is the ideal instrument to remove a splinter....