Thursday, January 5, 2012

Experiencing an injury in whichever joint: Elbow, ankle, knee, etc, What to do if you can't afford a doctor

   How many of you have experienced some kind of injury in any part of your body? Well I have, and it has been my ankle mostly with a severe ankle sprain. I have had Itband tendinitis in each of my legs too from running but they healed around the same time as a sprain would typically heal, that is if you kept up with it. A muscle strain or tear is way different than a sprain in your joints. Itband tendinitis is one kind of muscle strain and it happens to be in your legs, on the side. It's a long band that extends from your hip down to your knee and hooks. A strain or a joint sprain is either acute, moderate or sever....1st degree, 2nd degree or 3rd degree.

   Now in terms of a broken joint, such as an ankle or elbow, you'll know if it's broken or not if you'll just realize what your abilities are, how much pain you are in and how much inflammation you may have in that area. An acute break can involve just some pain and instability, a moderate break can involve more pain, instability and some inflammation and a sever break involves lots and lots of pain, no instability what so ever and a ton of inflammation in the area. Lots of pain everyday. The key is to ice, ice and ice to get the blood to slow down so you can see what's going on with the joint so you can make a judgment. You don't need to get an X-ray right away, just don't move the hurt joint at all!! And get the inflammation down first to determine things.Once you have gotten the blood flow to slow down and the area to shrink, then you can feel around the area with your fingers for like holes or pointy spots where a bone could be broken or pierced through your skin. If there's a hole, that means maybe it's an avulsion fracture where the muscle tendon pulls real hard and pulls a chunk of bone with it. Closed bone fractures are when the bone breaks inside the skin and open bone fractures are wen the bone breaks through the skin. A compression fracture happens when two bones collide or compress each other. If you're unsure and it's very painful, I would try to get an X-ray as cheap as you can!
Now a sprain can almost feel the same way. You get the acute, moderate or sever symptoms. Whether you can function a little bit not at all and how much inflammation you have. You do the same thing - just ice, ice and ice, and elevate your foot if it's your foot, if not then still... just let your affected area turn to normal almost again and massage it/exercise it. As long as you keep working it and stretching it, letting it recover in a healthy way it will get strong again, and nothing should happen for a while or ever again, if you pay attention!

I have sprained my right ankle in soccer when I was in middle school. It happened during indoor soccer. Year s later in 2006 during a cross country meet I rolled the same ankle on a root and sprained it. Just after 2 weeks and some treatment I was back to running and I ended up going to Ohio's state tournament for my high school. Then 5 years later again I was running in a park through a hilly trail, I was running and hit a root once again. I messed up my ankle bad. I sprained 2 ligaments severely. Without any X-rays or huge treatments, I healed it myself and rehabbed just because I'm a specialist and I've studied these things. By the second week I was walking and partially running on it. By the 3rd week it was flexible again.

No comments:

Post a Comment