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Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#131

Post by madaxe_again »

tomaytotomato wrote: post #13

I had a bad pilon fracture of my ankle a couple of years ago with both a break on Tibia and Fibia. I fell off a ramp whilst pushing a wheelbarrow full of rubble into a skip (should've stuck to building code instead of building a house!). Normally that type of injury is associated with car crashes when someone instinctively puts all their force on the brake and the shock of the crash travels up the pedal into the ankl…

I crushed my leg a few years ago, my wife and I dropped a bridge on it, and I suddenly had 200kg of steel and wood grind down the back of it, and the front slammed into a concrete footing.

Internally degloved my calf, broke my fibula, and took a chunk out of my tibia - and being me, decided to ice it, strap it, look out for compartmentalisation and rhabdomyolysis, and hobble around on it until it was better. Took about two months before I could walk normally.

I only know what I did to it because I dislocated my knee last year skiing, and they were thoroughly confused as to what they were looking at - had to explain that I mashed my leg and couldn’t be bothered wasting my time sitting in A&E for a few days.

Either way, it healed just fine with zero intervention. My calf is a slightly funny shape from the fascia still being bunched up around my ankle, but it doesn’t seem to do any harm, and the break to the fibula healed almost perfectly - slightly offset but works just fine.

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#132

Post by erikerikson »

edwcross wrote: post #20
ehnto wrote: post #3

The pathology for broken collar bones was changing right as I took up mountain biking, and subsequently shattered my collarbone. It was hotly debated at the hospital, if my specific case should be operated on or not. Each time I had a checkup, one doctor would say "wait and see" while the other was saying "I can't believe we didn't operate on this". At any rate, the outcome was as good as if they had operated on it,…

Given the amount of injuries related to mountain biking, is there some specific insurance needed for it? It seems one of those "net-negative for the society activities", like trampolines.

Kids have so much joy on trampolines! I know they have dangers but net negative? Do you have data or anything?

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#133

Post by canucker2016 »

MichaelDickens wrote: post #121
canucker2016 wrote: post #7

from https://www.outsideonline.com/health/training-performance/fo... ... After a heroic research effort that took 2.5 years and 500,000 euros, he and his colleagues had managed to shepherd a large group of frail, elderly subjects through a six-month strength-training program. Those who had taken a daily protein supplement managed to pack on an impressive 2.9 pounds of new muscle. Success! Old people could be strong!…

> In total, there were 3.1 pounds of beef—a graphic visualization of the muscle lost in just one week by subjects of a bed-rest study the student had just completed. This is significantly out of line with other research I've seen. Marusic et al. (2021) meta-analysis[1] found an average muscle loss of ~2% after 5 days. It did not report average absolute muscle loss, but the average person has about 1/3 of bodyweight a…

The meta-analysis study you cite suggests 2% loss @ 5 days and 5% loss at 10 days at the knee extensor muscles.

Notice that percentage loss is more than double for a doubling of bedrest time. It's not linear.

You're suggesting that muscle loss at the knee extensor is the same percentage for the rest of the body.

from the full text of the bedrest study mentioned in the outsideonline.com article - muscle loss was measured via DXA scan. see https://diabetesjournals.org/diabetes/article/65/10/2862/350...

    After 1 week of bed rest, participants lost 1.4 ± 0.2 kg (range: 0.6 to 2.8 kg) lean tissue mass (Fig. 1A) (P

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#134

Post by gamblor956 »

faitswulff wrote: post #6

If anyone's heard of RICE (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation) for healing joints, the new guidance is called POLICE: Protect, Optimal Load, Ice, Compression, and Elevation. The key differences being Protect and Optimal Load, meaning don't re-injure it and expose it to some level of weight-bearing or usage.

It's HELM now: Heat, Exercise, Lower, and Massage. They're all designed to maximize blood flow to, and inflammation in, the injured area. (Note that exercise just means to keep it moving.) Ice and elevation restrict the flow of fluids in and out of the injured area; ice especially slows down recovery and is only recommended for pain management.

(This is basically a simplified version of the protocol NFL teams have been using.)

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#135

Post by kenjackson »

faitswulff wrote: post #6

If anyone's heard of RICE (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation) for healing joints, the new guidance is called POLICE: Protect, Optimal Load, Ice, Compression, and Elevation. The key differences being Protect and Optimal Load, meaning don't re-injure it and expose it to some level of weight-bearing or usage.

The guy who termed RICE (Gabe Mirkin) later came out and said he made a mistake. Specifically with the "Ice" part (and partially with Rest). See: https://drmirkin.com/fitness/why-ice-delays-recovery.html

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#136

Post by BizarroLand »

My brother broke both of his legs in the Army Ranger parachuting school a few years ago. He landed wrong because of weird instructions and heard the crack but after they patted him down and told him he was good he spent 2 weeks trying to walk it off.

Finally the pain got to be too much and they took him in for x-rays. Needed screws all throughout his legs and 2 months to heal.

Now he's fine, goes out for daily runs, still in the military (but failed the Ranger class because he couldn't finish the jump training) and is mostly upset about not being a ranger.

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#137

Post by timewizard »

taneq wrote: post #22

The human body (like most fit organisms) is antifragile. It needs to be challenged. In this context, people who think "ooh that hurts I'll never do that again" and carefully avoid discomfort find that, by middle age, they can't do anything, and everything hurts. Meanwhile people who think "ooh that hurts, I'd better practise it until it doesn't" are still fully functional into old age because they push their bodies i…

I broke my shoulder and they immediately offered me a handicapped placard.

I am the type of person to become offended at the suggestion.

I parked at the back of the lot and took the longest walk I could instead.

That has paid off.

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#138

Post by webnrrd2k »

edwcross wrote: post #20
ehnto wrote: post #3

The pathology for broken collar bones was changing right as I took up mountain biking, and subsequently shattered my collarbone. It was hotly debated at the hospital, if my specific case should be operated on or not. Each time I had a checkup, one doctor would say "wait and see" while the other was saying "I can't believe we didn't operate on this". At any rate, the outcome was as good as if they had operated on it,…

Given the amount of injuries related to mountain biking, is there some specific insurance needed for it? It seems one of those "net-negative for the society activities", like trampolines.

There is no specific insurance required that I'm aware of... It's an activity that's well within the normal allowance of jackassery that everyone is entitled to.

I think that a big part of the issue is that banning it sounds a little like banning all sex because someone might get a venereal disease. Yeah, maybe there are some negatives, but there are also a lot of positives, and people are really like the positives.

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#139

Post by thaumasiotes »

doix wrote: post #33
4ggr0 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing which comes to mind is - why should we stop at sports, then? we'll immediately be at the point where smokers, alcoholics, obese people etc. should pay more, after all, their way of life statistically causes higher costs. (i don't think either of those things should result in higher insurance prices, just continuing the thought.)

> we'll immediately be at the point where smokers, alcoholics, obese people etc. should pay more, after all, their way of life statistically causes higher costs. Wait, do they not? I genuinely assumed they did. I remember when I got private insurance through my work I had to fill in some questionnaire. It was "free", but it was a taxable benefit so you knew how much you were costing the company and me and my friends…

>> we'll immediately be at the point where smokers [...] should pay more, after all, their way of life statistically causes higher costs.

> Wait, do they not?

Why should they? It's not obvious at all that smoking causes higher costs; a smoker who gets lung cancer is a smoker who never needs the medical care we give to the elderly.

Re: Broken legs and ankles heal better if you walk on them within weeks

#140

Post by thaumasiotes »

marssaxman wrote: post #129
myheartisinohio wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People slip in the shower so lets stop bathing.

I've been advocating mandatory shower-helmet laws for many years now; it would make as much sense as a lot of the other nanny-state regulation does.

On the other hand, mandatory rough surfaces on the floor of showers seem pretty reasonable.
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