Crash & Burn
The importance of treatment and rehabilitation of injuries.
By Wm. Moritz Hardwick, D.C.
The rider broke the hill, a combination of man and machine, sweat and grease, muscle and carbon fiber. He cut to the right to avoid a tree, then to the left while lifting his front wheel from the ground to rise over a large root. Clearing the root, he found himself on a downhill slope. The ground was hard, dry; the lack of rain this season caused cracks in the surface and ruts to be unforgiving. A limb reached from his left, he swerved, eluding it as if it were a beast, the rider smiled. Breaks were applied as he noticed the incline growing steeper. His front tire spun off a loose rock, turning his wheel, he grabbed both breaks. The wheel dipped into a rut that caused the bike to freeze; yet the rider did not. Over the handlebars the rider flew. Extending his hands before him to try and break his fall, the rider collided with the harsh ground below. Sharp rocks dug into the leather biking gloves and the flesh of his forearms. There was a snap. An odd sound that emitted from deep within his right hand, a sound that he immediately knew would cause pain in the seconds to follow. His body rolled to the side, the momentum being shifted as he tried to maneuver himself from his hands onto his back. Then came the base of a tree, which stopped all of his forward motion. Heavy breathing and tiny rocks drifting down the side of the hill were the only noises he heard while he sat quietly holding his right hand with his left, waiting for the pain.
Three hours later, the rider had become a patient. He sat within the doctor’s office awaiting results from the X-Ray films. A few moments later, the doctor arrived, films in hand, and they were placed upon the illuminated view box; the image was quite revealing. The patient presented with a clean break of the bone that resides at the base of the thumb (1st metacarpal bone), and between the actual wrist bones. The patient was then given a splint for the fracture and issued instructions regarding the proper care of the fracture. This included removing the splint on a daily basis and mobilizing the joint that was just distal to the break, and to return to the doctor’s office on a weekly basis to monitor healing and to administer therapy in the involved tissues.
Four Weeks later, the patient returned to the office. An X-Ray image was taken of the break revealing that it had healed nicely. However, upon examination of the area, the joint next to the break had no motion in it. Meaning, he could not bend it, nor could it be flexed what so ever. When the patient was asked where he had been and if he had been doing the exercises prescribed by the doctor, the patient replied that he couldn’t make it into the office and he had not been doing the exercises. This was obvious, especially since the joint was frozen in place.
What has been described here is a worse case scenario. The rider fractured a bone in his hand. When the fracture healed, scar tissue formed in the nearby joint due to his lack seeking continued therapy and treatment, and not moving that joint for the 4 weeks. Therefore, the joint froze up and the patient will never be able to flex that joint again.
With every injury you acquire you also gain scar tissue within joints, muscles, ligaments, and tendons. This scar tissue restricts motion, is more painful, and doesn’t go away unless you seek proper treatment to resolve the injury. This includes, but is not limited to, a minor or major fall, sprain of a joint (ankle, wrist, elbow…), broken bone(s), strain or torn muscle. Any injury results in scar tissue formation.
The moral of the story, get yourself fixed with every injury. Otherwise, in a few years, you’ll say something along the lines of, “I sure can’t move like I used to.”