UKC

Around 5 weeks ago I injured one of my fingers in a typical pulley-tendon type of way. Initially I ignored it, which predictably aggravated the problem. So, I then rested it for 10 days and started climbing easy stuff with it after that, with it taped, as I've done before. The difference this time is that whereas previously I've had quite sharp pain when pressing the underside of finger (base of finger), this time there's less pain, but if i keep the finger immobile for, say, 20 minutes, as in after nodding-off infront the TV, it goes very stiff, and is painful to start moving again. The stiffness is about the middle joint, and I've not experienced that before. So I'm wondering if anyone has had this specific problem and can give me some information on how their recovery progressed.

In reply to wurzelinzummerset:
Hi Wurzel, stop climbing and pick something else to do with your evenings that doesn't annoy your finger least you turn a one off acute injury into a chronic injury. There is no guarantee that anyone who had the same experience as you had the same problem or a treatment that would work in your situation.

Take some comfort in that many of the different home remedies recommended for treating a finger injury seem to work, it would appear rest and doing these is better than carrying on or resting and doing nothing.
Genuine finger pulley injuries don't heal over 10 days, you may be pain free in 6 weeks to 6 months but that just means it's stopped hurting not fully fixed.

In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

Synovitus rather than a tendon perhaps? A nice anatomical video: youtube.com/watch?v=Dz-CHXwLQ_k&

Pretty sure this is what I have developed in my middle finger. Since it isn't sharp pain I have ignored it for about 9 months and it has got worse to the point where I have booked a physio session to get it sorted and I expect he will recommend months off. The moral of the story is not to ignore the niggles or it will get worse!

In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

You need to give it weeks, not days. Completely trashed my A2 a few years ago and took several months to recover.
Try both 'straight' and 'H' taping to see which works best for you. One handed climbing or taping/splinting you damaged finger to it's nearest neighbour (so you can't bend it) can help speed up recovery without having to give up climbing.

In reply to Angrypenguin:


That's useful, thanks. It could be that in conjunction with the pulley tendons. I'll read some more on it when I've time.

In reply to mmmhumous:


I know. Previously it's taken upto 3 months for the pain to go (on a different finger). I was more interested in the specific problem with the finger joint which I've not experienced before. The 10 days I referred to was along the lines of the school of thought that suggests a short rest period then very easy climbing that doesn't aggravate things, as opposed to the school of thought that suggests complete rest for five or so weeks.

In reply to alx:

That's probably the wisest thing to do. I'll keep it in mind.

In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

I switched to training with parallettes and gymnastic rings as I missed the movement aspects from climbing and the prospect of doing just core for two months was not that attractive.

Both pieces of equipment are ace and really challenge you and unlike free weights you work within your own strength to weight ratio which is useful for climbing.

In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

I wrote a blog on this a little while ago, which you can read in full here:

http://atouchofgnar.blogspot.de/2016/12/tweak-free-addicts-guide-to-injury-...

Short answer is immersion bathing, taping and plenty of gentle movement exercises followed by a progressive build into harder climbing via fitness laps on juggy routes and then fingerboarding to build strength once pain is vastly reduced.

Some advocate pure rest, but personal experience and the work of others (Dave Mac amongst others) suggests that they're wrong.

In reply to alx:


This is also excellent advice. Conditioning is great fun, will give your climbing a serious boost and will also make it less likely to be injured in future. Yoga/stretching is also another great avenue and can be social which helps.

Peg boards are also great when injured.

In reply to MischaHY:

Thanks for the link. I've adopted the climb-easy-juggy-stuff approach, and it's on the mend in so far as the pain is reduced to some soreness post-climb, rather than whilst pulling on the route. I climbed outside today briefly, without any great problem. So, basically it seems to be mending along the lines of my previous experiences, apart from the stiffness after it being immobile for a while which is reduced a little now, too.