As is sometimes the case, my hand didn't heal at all while the stitches were in place.  Dr. Tremor realized that they were causing more damage than helping, and removed them.  He said with my diabetes and decreased ability to heal, that the wound would have to heal from the inside out and the stitches just got in the way.  So he took them out, in favor of strips.  The strips fell off after a couple days, and the wound looked better than it had since it had happened.  He also told me to use the antibiotic once daily, and let the wound dry (which one of the nurses in the ER also said, but the ER doctor instructed otherwise).

Now, though it is still not healed (and there is a great deal of pain in it when I don't take painkillers--which I am avoiding right now), it is almost completely sealed.  I can't see all the way down through my skin into my muscle tissue--and sometimes glimpse my bone, as before.  It no longer extends around the side of my hand, and the opening is only about half an inch long, though the picture looks like it is longer (that is the peeling of the outer layers of skin along the edges of the original wound).

I really appreciate Dr. Tremor's experience with this kind of problem.