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sterno clavicular dislocation

tastybigmac

14-Mar-2006
3:10:03 PM

i found this on a paddling forum. does anyone have experience with these?

sterno clavicular dislocation
« on: March 13th, 2006, 8:38pm »

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any knowledge about this uncommon injury?
in jan this year, a friend of mine got dumped on the sand and had her collarbone dislocated at the sternum (specifically, anterior & superior).
the medicos advised rest, but she has since discovered that external reduction of the dislocation is possible only within 5-10 days.
she is, understandably, desparate for info... can anyone please help?

http://www.adventurepro.com.au/forums/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?board=paddlea&action=display&num=1142242697

sticky

14-Mar-2006
7:35:31 PM

Hi

Dunno what exactly you're looking for so I'll just through out some random bits from personal experience.

I have posterior subluxation at the sternoclavicular joint (think that's the right term). Happened in a game of rugby when a whole lot of big maori men collapsed on top of me. They did get the collarbone back in place that day, and it was held in place by a sling for the next few weeks. I imagine that would be important to preventing future reoccurrence. My collarbone was also fractured by a tackle later in the day, but that didn't affect the treatment of the subluxation to the best of my knowledge.

Took four or five weeks to get out of the sling, followed by another six weeks of exercises to strengthen the joints - even did some dips, but the clavicle sometimes popped out doing that, so I stopped them. Whenever I had contact - tackling, mauling, etc, the collarbone would subluxate and rest on the carotid artery, which wasn't a good thing at all. Painful too. The treatment suggested involved pinning the collarbone in place, but they said there was a 40% chance the pins would break free, with the risk that they would puncture the carotid artery. Don't know if they were trying to scare me or not. I said no, anyway. I had to give up contact sport, but it hasn't popped out when climbing except for one memorable occasion mid crux. Managed to pull through then and the clavicle popped back into place with a little gentle persuasion.

It is still mobile - whenever I raise or wheel my arms it will pop out just a little bit, but it hasn't seemed to affect my climbing and it is generally 'well behaved'. I have since heard of a treatment involving what is basically a set of elastic bands to hold the clavicle in place. Don't know more about this. It doesn't bother me much anymore, but sometimes I just have to be a little careful.

Kyle

ben wiessner

15-Mar-2006
12:43:08 PM

Kyle, I have to ask, when you broke your collarbone, was it on the same side as the dislocated sternoclavicular joint!? Sounds like you got a real workout that day!

sticky

15-Mar-2006
2:02:05 PM

On 15/03/2006 zenben wrote:
>Kyle, I have to ask, when you broke your collarbone, was it on the same
>side as the dislocated sternoclavicular joint!? Sounds like you got a real
>workout that day!

Yeah. didn't quite realise what I had done, just that I'd hurt myself. No regrets, I only started climbing after I couldn't play anymore.

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