Patients of all ages can experience trauma and fractures. These serious injuries can occur during auto accidents, life-threatening falls, and countless other scenarios. Unfortunately, they can have a long-term impact on patients’ functionality and even affect their quality of life.
Conditions
Bone fractures are extremely common, whether from high-energy trauma resulting in multiple injuries or from some other force or impact resulting in an isolated fracture and dislocation.
Our team expertly treats the full range of these injuries, no matter how complex, including long bone fractures of the upper and lower extremities. We also specialize in treating post-traumatic conditions such as malunions and nonunions (fractures that fail to heal properly) and osteomyelitis.
Trauma and Fracture Symptoms
Symptoms of a fracture or a post-traumatic orthopaedic condition can include:
- A clearly misshapen limb or joint, sometimes accompanied by broken skin or visible & bone (an open or compound fracture)
- Fever
- Pain, ranging from mild to severe
- Restricted movement
- Swelling, bruising, tenderness, or numbness near the fracture
Diagnosis
Fractures and post-traumatic orthopaedic conditions are typically diagnosed with a combination of a physical examination and imaging.
Fractures are usually diagnosed using X-rays. Depending on the severity and location of the break or post-traumatic injury – and the extent of damage to surrounding tissue – other types of imaging might also be used to make a diagnosis. These include:
- Arthrograms (X-rays of the joints)
- Computed tomography (CT)
- Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
Other diagnostic testing might be used instead of or in addition to those tests. Identifying a bone infection, for instance, calls for blood work, while diagnosing a compressed nerve might require a nerve-blocking injection.