Scaphoid Fracture

[dkooner]

Hi all,

I fractured the scaphoid bone in my right wrist in 1999 while playing soccer at age 15 (now 23). I have a high tolerance for pain and thought it was just a sprain and continued playing. The swelling went down a week or so later and i went on with life. Sometimes i would feel pain when i wrote for a long period and finally went to see a doc about 3 months later. Discovered a fracture and had surgery about 2 more months later as it was not serious. The surgeon used 2 pins to screw the 2 pieces of the scaphoid bone back together.

It has been almost 8 yeasr since the surgery and everything healed well...and i got about 90% flexibilty back and complete strength back which is great.

Question is, does anybody who has had this facture and pins experience any pain in general? Sometimes when i am doing push ups, i feel a slight pain in my wrist.

thanks to anyone who has any words...:)

[dkooner]

forgot to mention that i had a bone graft done since the scaphoid bone had died...

[Zaynah]

hi

i'm a physiotherapist from south africa.

A scaphoid fracture is very common. You had avascular necrosis, where the bone died due to not getting enough blood supply. Unfortunately this results in a poorer prognosis. You must remember that your scaphoid bone doesn't 'look' normal in its anatomical shape and size. So when you do something like a pushup that pushes this bone into a tight locked position with the other surrounding bones, it can cause some pain and discomfort. Your scaphoid takes on alot of weight when you are in a pushup position... your wrist is pushed backwards into the locked position. This strains all the ligaments keeping all your wristbones together, and puts alot of pressure on the scaphoid. Usually with a bad scaphoid fracture and many operations, the ligament connecting the scaphoid to the other small bones get damaged and may cause instability or stiffness.

My advice is to do pushups on your fists on a soft surface (gymgloves and rubber mat), keeping your wrists neutral. The weight of your body through your arms are going through the midpoint of your wrist, and not through the scaphoid bone. This will lessen the strain on all the structures in this complex wrist structure.

Hope this helps.:)

[dkooner]

thanks for the advice Zaynah

ill have to try that for sure :)

do u know if people ever get the pins removed ?

[dkooner]

thanks for the advice Zaynah

ill have to try that for sure :)

do u know if people ever get the pins removed ?

[Zaynah]

your welcome

sometimes the surgeon's remove the internal fixation used for fractures (pins and screws). it's about preference of the surgeon and patient, and the main concern is if the pin/screws are causing impingement problems, are prominent etc.

Removing the hardware if neccessary shouldn't be a problem, but you had a graft done aswell, and it might be tricky to remove the hardware without damaging the graft. discuss this with your surgeon if this concerns you. :)

[dkooner]

thanks again

i was just curious, but its been almost 8 years now . i do remember him saying if u want to, we can remove the pins later on but i cant stand going thru surgery again!

i appreciate ur help though :)

[Zaynah]

-if they don't bother you (impinge, catch or prominent), then leave them. they can't do any harm being left there.

Good luck