A fractured wrist is when you break one of the small (carpal) bones in this joint or, more commonly, the distal radius, which is the larger of the two bones that make up the forearm.
When you injure your wrist you can usually tell and know what type of wrist injury you have by the angle at which the wrist hit the ground or whatever it hit when you injured the wrist
For example the more the wrist is bent back (extension), the more likely the scaphoid bone will break and the less wrist extension it is more likely the lower arm bone (radius) will break.
Scaphoid fractures are not always immediately obvious.
The only way to know 100 percent what type of wrist injury you have is to get the wrist X Ray'd to determine and show for sure what type of wrist injury you sustained.
Things you can do to help your sprained wrist heal faster include.
Avoid use of the wrist until it heals.
Wrap the wrist.
Rest your wrist for at least 48 hours.
Ice your wrist to reduce pain and swelling.
Compress the wrist with a bandage.
Elevate your wrist above your heart, on a pillow or the back of a chair.
Take anti-inflammatory painkillers.
Use a cast or splint to keep your wrist immobile.
When you have a sprained wrist you should avoid use of the sprained wrist until it heals and also avoid movement of the sprained wrist as it can make the sprained wrist worse.
Don't try to shake it off to help it heal as shaking the sprain wrist can also make it harder for it to heal and make the sprained wrist worse.
You should wrap a sprained wrist.
When you sprain your wrist, it's recommended to wrap the sprained wrist as soon as possible; this stabilizes the joint and facilitates recovery.
Wrapping the sprained wrist is also one of the more effective remedies for carpal tunnel pain, as well as inflammation and other hand related injuries.
If you broke your wrist then joint will be either crooked or misaligned while a sprained wrist will cause swelling as well as pain and the wrist will most likely not be crooked or misaligned.
When the bones of your wrist are broken, they cause the joint to look crooked or misaligned.
In contrast, a wrist sprain will result in swelling but does not typically cause crookedness.
In very severe cases, a broken wrist may have bone protruding through the skin.
Hairline fractures in a wrist do not usually need a cast to repair and heal.
Most hairline fractures usually heal by themselves but usually require immobilization.
Continued exposure to weight bearing or force can slow the healing process.
The difference between a sprain and a fracture is the sprain is a soft tissue injury while a fracture is a break in the bone.
Yes a fracture can be mistaken for a sprain and it happens pretty often.
With a sprain, you feel pain.
But if you have numbness or tingling, your ankle is most likely broken.
Where is the pain? If your ankle hurts or is tender to the touch directly over your ankle bone, you probably have a fracture.
A fracture is worse than a sprain in terms of injury while a sprain is worse than a fracture in terms of pain.
For example a broken ankle is a more severe injury than a sprained ankle.
With a clean break that doesn't need surgery, recovery can take around 6 to 8 weeks.
If you need surgery, recovery will take longer. With a minor ankle sprain, it may take around 2 weeks to heal.
Sprains can be extremely painful, and are easy to confuse as a break.
Many times, they are more painful than a fracture, which has been confirmed by science.
You can drink alcohol with a fracture but if you do drink alcohol with a fracture it can take longer for the fracture to heal because alcohol can slow the healing of the bone fracture.
Alcohol slows healing on the cellular and molecular levels.
Physicians have long observed that binge drinking can significantly impair the healing process following a bone fracture.
A fracture and a break of the bone are the same thing although you may only have a hairline fracture which is less severe than a full on break of the bone.
The best fruit for bones and to help keep and build strong bones and help bones heal include.
Blackberries.
Blueberries.
Figs, dried, uncooked.
Grapes.
Kiwi fruit, fresh, raw.
Mulberries.
Plums, dried (prunes)
Pomegranate juice.
The best foods to eat to heal bones include protein-rich foods like lean meats, low-fat dairy products, beans, nuts, and fortified cereals.
Leafy green vegetables like collard greens, spinach, broccoli, and kale are high in calcium, another important part of bone repair.
Vitamins C and Vitamin D help you heal broken bones.
Collagen is a protein that's an important building block for bone.
Vitamin C helps your body make collagen, which helps your bone fracture heal.
Several large research studies have shown that taking vitamin D decreases the risk of fractures.
This includes foot and ankle fractures as well as other fractures, such as hip and wrist fractures.
Improved fracture healing has also been found in people taking vitamin D.
The 4 stages of bone healing are.
1: The formation of hematoma at the break.
2: The formation of a fibrocartilaginous callus.
3: The formation of a bony callus.
4: The remodeling and addition of compact bone.
Things that can slow down bone healing include consumption of caffeine, alcohol, smoking, putting weight on the bone too soon, movement of the bone too soon and also taking anti inflammatory medicines.
If you leave a fracture untreated the fracture may take longer to heal or may not heal at all depending on the fracture.
If it's a minor fracture then it may not even need treatment to heal as most minor fractures heal on their own.
However more severe or major fractures such as a broken hip, broken arm, broken leg etc would need treatment and a cast to heal properly.
When a bone fracture is untreated, it can result in either a nonunion or a delayed union.
In the former case, the bone doesn't heal at all, which means that it will remain broken.
As a result, swelling, tenderness, and pain will continue to worsen over time.
Most minor fractures will heal on their own, but only if you refrain from activities that put weight or stress on the affected area.
During your recovery time, it's important to modify your activity. Once the pain is gone and you're ready to get back in action, do it slowly to avoid re-injury.
Healed fractures can show up on Xrays and even old fractures can show up on xrays.
The break of a freshly broken bone will show up as a black “crack” on the x-ray showing where the bone was broken.
When the fracture has healed, the healed bone has greater density than the unbroken bone and will show up in the same place, but white.
In any case, the healed bone will show up on x-rays for the rest of your life.
They have found healed bones in Egyptian mummies when they were x-rayed, so the broken bones will still show up two thousand years after your death.
Also the colors may be reversed depending on the use (or not) of digital processing.
Most of the time the bone remodels so that in 10 years it’s not possible to see where a fracture occurred.
In situations where the bony anatomy is not restored close to normal alignment this can lead to a mal union and can be detected years later.
Sometimes the healing process may leave a callus which is extra bone growth around a complex fracture which will show up in an XRAY long after the injury.