Врач говорит, что рану нужно промывать водой каждый день.

Because рану is the accusative singular form of рана (wound).

In this sentence, the wound is the direct object of промывать (to rinse / wash / clean repeatedly), so Russian uses the accusative:

• рана = nominative, the basic dictionary form
• рану = accusative, used for the thing being treated

Since рана is a feminine noun ending in -а, its accusative singular changes to -у.

Что means that here.

It connects the two parts of the sentence:

• Врач говорит = The doctor says
• что рану нужно промывать водой каждый день = that the wound needs to be rinsed with water every day

So it works just like English that in a sentence like The doctor says that...

Нужно means something like it is necessary, one must, or needs to be done.

Russian often uses impersonal constructions, where English would use a dummy subject like it. So instead of saying:

• It is necessary to rinse the wound every day

Russian simply says:

• Рану нужно промывать водой каждый день

Literally, it is more like:

• The wound, it-is-necessary to rinse with water every day

This is very common in Russian.

Because after нужно, Russian normally uses the infinitive.

So the pattern is:

• нужно + infinitive = need to / must / it is necessary to

Examples:

• Нужно работать = It is necessary to work / One needs to work
• Нужно читать = One needs to read
• Нужно промывать = One needs to rinse / wash repeatedly

Here, промывать expresses the action that is necessary.

Because промывать is the imperfective form, and it fits the idea of a repeated or habitual action.

The sentence says каждый день (every day), so this is not a one-time action. It is something done regularly.

• промыть = perfective, usually to rinse / wash through once, to completion
• промывать = imperfective, to rinse / wash repeatedly or as an ongoing process

Since the doctor is talking about daily care, промывать is the natural choice.

Водой is the instrumental singular form of вода (water).

Russian often uses the instrumental case to show the means, tool, or substance used to do something.

So:

• вода = water
• водой = with water

In this sentence, the wound is being rinsed with water, so the instrumental is used.

A useful question to remember is:

• чем? = with what?

Here, the answer is:

• водой = with water

Мыть usually means to wash in a general sense.

Промывать is more specific. It often means:

• to rinse
• to wash out
• to flush
• to clean by washing through

For a wound, промывать is especially natural because it suggests careful cleaning/rinsing, often as a medical instruction.

So мыть рану might sound less precise, while промывать рану sounds more like proper wound care.

Каждый день uses the accusative form.

This is a very common Russian way to express repeated time:

• каждый день = every day
• каждую неделю = every week
• каждый месяц = every month

Here:

• каждый agrees with день
• день is masculine, so каждый день is the masculine accusative form, which looks the same as the nominative because день is inanimate

So this phrase functions adverbially and tells you how often the action happens.

Yes. Russian word order is more flexible than English word order because grammatical roles are shown mostly by case endings, not just position.

The sentence as given:

• Врач говорит, что рану нужно промывать водой каждый день.

This is a neutral, natural order.

Other word orders are possible, for example:

• Врач говорит, что каждый день нужно промывать рану водой.
• Врач говорит, что водой нужно промывать рану каждый день.

These can shift emphasis slightly, but the basic meaning stays the same.

English relies much more on fixed word order, so this flexibility often feels unusual to learners.

Russian often leaves that unspecified when the context makes it obvious.

In this sentence, the focus is on the medical instruction itself:

• the wound needs to be rinsed with water every day

It does not matter grammatically whether the patient, a nurse, or someone else does it.

If Russian wants to say who needs to do it, it can add a dative noun or pronoun:

• Вам нужно промывать рану каждый день. = You need to rinse the wound every day.
• Ему нужно промывать рану каждый день. = He needs to rinse the wound every day.

But here the sentence stays impersonal.

Врач is grammatically a masculine noun, even when it refers to a female doctor.

This is common with some profession nouns in Russian. In many contexts, the masculine form is used as the standard profession name.

So you can say:

• Врач говорит... even if the doctor is a woman

If needed, other words in the sentence may show the doctor’s actual sex, especially in the past tense:

• Врач сказала... = The doctor said... and the doctor is female
• Врач сказал... = The doctor said... and the doctor is male

But in the present tense, говорит does not show gender, so врач works for either.

Yes, говорит is the 3rd person singular present tense of говорить (to say / to speak).

It agrees with врач:

• врач говорит = the doctor says / is saying

Russian present-tense verbs change according to person and number, so говорит means:

• he says
• she says
• it says

Here, because the subject is врач, the translation is the doctor says.

Yes, in many situations you could say:

• Врач говорит, что рану надо промывать водой каждый день.

This would mean almost the same thing.

Both надо and нужно can mean need to / must / it is necessary to. In many everyday contexts, they are interchangeable.

Very roughly:

• надо can sound a little more conversational
• нужно can sound a bit more neutral or formal

But the difference is often small, and both are common.

The main stresses are:

• врач
• го-во-рит
• ра-ну
• ну-жно
• про-мы-вать
• во-дой
• каж-дый
• день

A rough pronunciation guide:

• Врач = vrach
• говорит = gava-REET
• рану = RA-nu
• нужно = NOOZH-na or NOOZH-no depending on careful vs. casual pronunciation
• промывать = prama-VAT’
• водой = vadai
• каждый день = KAZH-dy den’

A learner should especially notice that unstressed о is often pronounced more like a in standard Russian pronunciation, so говорит and водой may not sound exactly like they are spelled.