Doctor visit #3:
I took Ian to see the orthopedist again on Tuesday, October 5th. The first thing they did was take off his cast and xray his finger. They had me stay in the examining room across from the xray room and I could hear Ian howling when they did it. With the door closed.
He cried off and on while we waiting for the doctor to come in.
Just holding back tears, not happy with my picture-taking:
He also complained about “some ‘ting’ smells stinky in here” (his uncasted hand was a little ripe). LOL
Pinky finger knuckle is swollen and still a little bruised:
It was the same deal, the student PA came in and asked the same 10 questions we’ve been asked 10 times already. For approximately the millionth time, she asked Ian to bend his fingers and flex his hand. Having been asked a million other times, he’s figured out that it hurts and he refused.
Non-student PA came in shortly after and was AWESOME. AWESOME! AWESOME! AWESOME!
He specializes in pediatric orthopedists and he was UNBELIEVABLE with Ian. He had Ian laughing and playing along. Ian didn’t really cooperate with the bending and flexing (“um, I don’t ‘tink’ so!” when asked) but they managed to trick him into it a bit. Enough for them to feel comfortable that there isn’t any ligament damage and no other pain besides in the bone where it was broken.
Have I mentioned that I really liked this guy? He was so awesome with Ian. He even teased Ian about his hand being stinky which made Ian laugh.
Happier after the funny doctor guy came in:
Slightly better shot of his hand:
I got to see the xrays.
The bone is still slightly displaced but WAAAY less than before. Awesome PA dude kind of glossed over everything and was like “he’s fine! yay! let’s cast him up!” and moving on with everything. I made him backtrack and explain to me why he wasn’t concerned about it being “off” in the xray.
He showed me in the xray where the bone (from Ian’s broken knuckle area down to the webby/palm area of the hand) is growing more bone. I’m sure there is a better way to explain this but hey, I’m an accountant.
He said that his body is already compensating for the “off” part of the bone by growing new bone on that side. Essentially, the finger will grow so that the “off” part will be lined up and everything will in alignment once it’s completely healed. Hopefully that makes sense. I’m having a hard time explaining.
Can you see (on the far left finger) how the bone is just slightly displaced at the knuckle and the new bone growth is accommodating it? The darker white bone on the left side is new bone growth.
So, basically, it just needs more time and protection and should take care of itself. They put another splinty cast on him, wrapped it with an ace bandage and had us set up an appt for the 15th.
New splinty cast:
Doctor visit #4:
Ian was in a lot of pain overnight Thursday October 14th to Friday October 15th. He was moaning off and on all night long and at 2:30am, woke up crying pretty bad. His splint/casty thing had basically slid off his hand. We had to unwrap it to put it back on (not a fun time) and discovered a big, half dollar sized sore on the fleshy part of his thumb, almost down to his palm area. I think probably it was hurting him and he was messing with it in his sleep until he moved the cast out of place.
Luckily, we had his follow up orthopedist appointment scheduled for Friday morning so, we wrapped him back up (leaving the sore exposed with a Bandaid on it) and then I took him in for his 7:30am appointment.
His appointment was at their downtown office. We got there early so I took pictures while I waited for the office to open.
The little bit of downtown that we could see from the car, while the sun rose:
And the flags in the parking lot:
(Do non-US/Canada-border-towns fly Canadian flags? If there is an American flag flying here, you’re damn well guaranteed to see a Canadian flag flying right beside it. LOL)
Ian cried when unwrapping his hand but didn’t cry for xrays. Yay! Progress!
We saw the same awesome PA guy that we saw last time. He pulled the xrays up and you could CLEARLY see that the bone was all healed (YAY!!!!!). You’d never know there was a break! He even pulled up Ian’s last xray to show the comparison. (I didn’t get a picture because we were in an open area and I didn’t get a moment alone to snap a shot.)
The awesome PA guy taped his pinky and ring fingers together and told us to continue doing so for the next week to two weeks to give it a little bit more time but that he’s really all healed. He was able to touch, manipulate Ian’s fingers a little and Ian did not react in pain.
Wrapped fingers:
The bad news is, the sore on his hand is causing a LOT of pain. The awesome PA guy did one of those “yeah, you guys had the ace bandage too tight and it caused this”. Um, yeah buddy? YOUR STAFF TIED THE ACE BANDAGE. Thankyouverymuch! I didn’t say anything because pointing fingers doesn’t change anything but, quite frankly, that really pissed me off.
He said that a sore like that can take a really long time to heal…that it probably would take 2 months. It’s not quite an open wound but the skin is very raw. He said to keep it clean and for a little while to put Neosporin and a large Bandaid on it to protect it until the skin healed up a little. He gave me the warning signs of infection (red area spreads, leaking fluids, etc) so we’ll have to watch that. Hopefully, it improves quickly.
Sore on Ian’s hand (it actually looked WORSE than it photographed):
I took Ian to the grocery store and pretty much bought the entire store out of Bandaids and Neosporin. LOL I bandaged Ian’s hand up in the parking lot and he giggled during the process. No complaints about pain so I’m hoping he’s just being overly dramatic about how much it hurts. I took him to school after that and he had a great day. No issues and his hand seemed fine.
Post 10/15 update:
So far things are going well.
Ian’s hand was atrophied from being wrapped up and not used much over the course of the last few weeks. I was worried that as long as the sore hurt Ian that he would continue to “nurse” his left hand and that it would make it difficult to get the strength back.
After almost a week with no cast, Ian is using his hand much more and his flexibility improves daily. He periodically needs to be reminded that he can use his left hand but I suspect this will continue to improve over time.
We continued with the 2 strips of tape on the fingers until Wednesday when we started using 1 strip around the lower knuckle area. Today will mark the first day we’re going to go without taped fingers. I mostly don’t think Ian really needed the tape. I think it was a security blanket for him.
After using Neosporin and Bandaids on his sore for 4 days, we’ve started leaving the sore uncovered. I was afraid that having it bandaged up would prevent it from healing properly. (Of course, I was afraid that having it exposed would lead to infection. You just can’t win.)
Ian was regressed a little in terms of “babying” his hand when we took the Bandaid off but quickly adjusted. In the last few days, you’d really never know there was a sore there. He doesn’t want you to touch it but he’s adjusted just fine.
Hopefully the sore will heal up quickly. I’m going to be very glad when we can move on with our lives.
On a happy note, the first step of the moving on process will occur today when we take Ian back to bowling for the first time since his injury. Yay!!!
iPhone update: Ian will be wearing tape for another week. When we told he needed to take the tape off, he freaked out. When we told him he couldn’t go bowling with his fingers taped, he was perfectly happy skipping bowling. Since we know how much he loves bowling, we know that he was REALLY freaked out. We told him he could leave it taped another week.