Arm started swelling and hurting a few days after IV from surgery
33f, non-smoker, normal BMI. Had mastoidectomy surgery last Wednesday that took about 4 hours. No complications, insertion of IV was done in my hand and went well. I had no pain with the insertion or removal and my arm felt normal until Friday. Hand itself felt fine, I had no bruising or discoloration on my hand.
It started swelling a little and became red and splotchy and slightly painful when touched. Went to the ER on Saturday because my ear also kept leaking. nurse said she didn't see anything, the doctor said she could feel the swelling and to make sure I didn't get a fever and come back it started to feel warm.
It just kept getting more painful over the days but only had some redness. On Monday the skin started to get noticeably more red (see first pic or collage), on Tuesday the bruises suddenly started showing up. Besides the redness and swelling in some spots I had no discoloration so far. Today all the spots that were red before, turned yellow. It hurts a lot now, especially when touched.
I had my post surgery checkup today, only 10 minutes were scheduled for it and the appointment ran late. Doctor was hurrying through the appointment and didn't really want to look at my arm. Also got antibiotics for my ear.