UKC

I've got a stubborn injury with a finger on my right hand. During the day etc. its alright, the same as all my other fingers. After a few routes at the wall, however, it starts to pain, though not in the joints: its more in the flesh surrounding the intermediate phalange. This limts my ability to use crimp / pocket hold or even any where pressure may be exerted on that part of the finger (a part usually in contact with the climbing hold).

This has been going on for about three months now and a break of a fortnight from climbing didn't do anything except make me bored some evenings.

Will this heal of its own accord (just really f**king slowly)? Is there anything I can do with tape or anything else, aside from full cybernetic replacement?

In reply to Flinticus:

I have a similar issue except it kind hurts in every day life too. From what I've been told (and everyone has an opinion) recovery time is indeed long, average estimate I've been given is 45days minimum, and most advice is continue to climb, but only on jugs which basically means only doing severely overhanging stuff or do the same easy route a bunch of times over and try and train endurance. As for taping you can do a figure 8 style taping method but I've not found it overly helpful, best thing you can do really is tape the joints to prevent it from being a useful finger and hope that using it less speeds up recovery. To clarify though, this is all from crag folk none of whom are experienced physicians.

In reply to Flinticus:

Not a physio therapist but I've had two issues with fingers over the past year, after some self diagnosis I found that working with physio therapy putty helped get me back climbing. This link has some great excercises http://library.osfhealthcare.org/PatientEd/Rehabpdf/OTDocuments/NEWOT/Thera...
I was using green putty to begin with followed by blue as my hand started getting stronger. Hope it helps

In reply to Flinticus:

if it's not around the joint it might be a pulley injury, I would definitely recommend taking it easy, though if it's been 3 months that seems like a long time for one of those to heal. I really would go see a doctor and see if there's some kind of serious injury

In reply to Flinticus:

Have you been aggressively iceing it? I had a gammy finger that wouldn't keep aching for about 5 days at a time and keep reoccurring. It wasn't anything too serious but after the first day I iced it properly it was fine by the next day. I know that anything serious will take a lot longer but ice treatment if done properly really increases the bloodflow in the area iced and makes a big difference. Have a look at http://onlineclimbingcoach.blogspot.co.uk/2010/05/pulley-injuries-article.h...