What Bandage can withstand water the longest without peeling off?

Question: What Bandage, Curad, Walgreen Brand, Band-Aid, or Nexcare, can withstand water the longest without peeling completly off?

Hypothesis: I hypothesize that the Band-Aid brand will stay on the longest because it is one of the most commonly used bandages. If many people use this bandage, then it must mean that it works well and stays on for a while.

Procedure:

  1. Gather all of my materials

  2. Pick a bandage that I want to use first

  3. Place the bandage on my hand and place my hand in a bowl filled with water

  4. Move my hand around to add in the factors of movement

  5. After the bandage falls off, try again with the same bandage brand

  6. Then, after the second bandage falls off, find an average between the two times

  7. Finally, I will do the same for the rest and put the data I found in a graph

Conclusion:

In the end, Nexcare stayed on the longest. My hypothesis was incorrect because I hypothesized that Band-Aid brand would stay on longer than the rest. I believe that the Nexcare bandage stayed on the longest because it had more adhesive spots and a smaller cotton pad so that it wouldn’t peel off on any of the corners. This project was fairly accurate but there were definitely flaws. I could have found a better way of putting in factors of movement and weather which would make it even more accurate. Also, I should have tested it once more so that I could find a more accurate result. Other than that, my project was accurate and putting in movement improved the accuracy. Next year, I could keep experimenting with bandages and maybe find which waterproof bandage works the best in water.

Abstract:

Grace Stuart Which Bandage Can Stick The Longest?

For my science fair project my question was, “Which bandage brand can withstand water the longest; Band-Aid, Walgreen’s Brand, Nexcare, or Curiad?” When I get a scratch on my hand I usually want to choose the best bandage brand to cover it up. I hypothesized that the Band-Aid brand would stay on the longest because most people choose that brand to keep their cuts clean.

I placed the bandage on one hand and put it in a bowl filled with water. Then I moved my hand around or touched the bandage once and a while to also put in the factors of waves and other natural causes for the bandage to fall off in water. Finally, after the bandage fell off I recorded the time and redid the experiment a second time. After, I averaged out the two times to find the final.

The Band-Aid brand stayed on for an averaged time of 4.08 minutes, the Walgreen’s brand stayed on for 1.23 minutes, the Nexcare brand for 11.59 minutes, and the Curad brand for 1.38 minutes. I believe that Nexcare stayed on the longest because it was stretchy and around the soft pad on the center of the bandage there were adhesive spots to keep it even more sticky. Most of the other bandages had just a large cotton pad in the center which let more water into the bandage.

In the end my hypothesis wasn’t correct, I had hypothesized that the Band-Aid brand would stay on the longest. I did, however, find out that Nexcare was the best non-waterproof bandage to use if there is water around. Although I wasn’t correct, I still did learn something about bandages and how long they can stick. Some problems did occur throughout my experiments. One is that at first, I had chosen to use a balloon instead of skin to make it more accurate. Later, I realized that it would take days or several hours for the bandages to finally come off and my information would be hard to record. Another problem I had was that I couldn’t put all the factors of movement and play into my experiment so I decided that I would touch the bandage every so often. Other than that my experiments went well and I did eventually find what I was looking for.

Data Table:

Which Bandage Can Stick The Longest?

Graph: