You are in the middle of your run, and you have a blister. What do you do? Hopefully you have a mini blister kit in your hydration pack. If you don’t, pray to god you have one with your crew or in your drop bag. None there either? Make some friends at the next aid station and come better prepared next time.
Here is how I treat blisters. Disclaimer: doctors do not recommend popping blisters because you risk infection. If the blister is small and not painful to run on, I don’t pop it. I tape over it with hepafix (bought on Amazon) or kensio tape and keep going.
If the blister is painful to run on, clean the area with alcohol then I pop it with a clean safety pin making a hole big enough that it won’t reseal and fill with more fluid. I make the hole on an edge where it will continue to drain as I run (the hole on the side closest to my heel usually). I try to get as much fluid out of it as possible. If you can get the skin to lay flat, it may reattach itself if you can stop the friction. After I pop it, I put Neosporin on it and then tape over it with kensio or hepafix tape. I treat blood blisters the same way.
If you don’t want to pop the blister you can use mole skin with a hole in the center for the blister, then put tape over it (do you see a theme here?). The mole skin will keep the pressure off of the blister and reduce the pain.
If the roof is torn or off, I clean the area with alcohol. Put Neosporin on it then a piece of Second Skin for burns (bought on Amazon) over the exposed tender skin and then tape over it. Second Skin acts as the roof. It protects the tender skin from being rubbed even more. Once you are done running, you’ll want to expose that skin to the air so it can dry out and harden forming your new top layer of skin.
Blisters can also form under callouses and toenails. Callouses should be kept under control because of this. It’s difficult to treat a blister covered by a thick callous. You have to go through all that skin to drain it, if you can get to it at all. A blister under a toenail, is easier than under a callous. Stick a clean pin in it and tape it with hepafix. Don’t use a tape that is rough on the outside. You’ll likely lose the nail.
The best thing is to try and prevent blisters as much as possible. You can read my prior post by scrolling down to learn how to prevent blisters.
ultrarunningmom 