Anybody have any experience with one?
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HC:
My son cracked his olecranon (Type 1) the first game of his HS Jr year. The Dr. said it would heal in three months but it took five months to get 90%. The biggest issue was that he couldn't use the left tricep for five months. Then he got tendonitis in the tricep and is still dealing with that. In fact his right tricep is still stronger than the left after all the therapy and workouts.
Advice: go slow. My son didn't really rush it and still had problems unrelated to the actual bone break.
My son cracked his olecranon (Type 1) the first game of his HS Jr year. The Dr. said it would heal in three months but it took five months to get 90%. The biggest issue was that he couldn't use the left tricep for five months. Then he got tendonitis in the tricep and is still dealing with that. In fact his right tricep is still stronger than the left after all the therapy and workouts.
Advice: go slow. My son didn't really rush it and still had problems unrelated to the actual bone break.
Thanks for the information. Did he do any therapy during the initial three months?
My son had one at 14 yo. The recovery took quite a bit longer than anticipated. Then after he recovered from that he had pronator syndrome and had to take a lot of NSAIDs to help get over that. Back in July after a successful comeback he felt some elbow pain in a different location than where he had previously felt the pronator syndrome pain. We took him to the doc and the MRI showed a stress reaction in the olecranon. He took 7 weeks off from throwing and is in the third week of his throwing rehab which seems to be going quite well so far. He started some shoulder work a couple weeks before he started throwing again.
We're pretty sure that some of the therapy he did do at the PT caused a brachialis muscle strain that most likely contributed to the pronator syndrome.
My guess is that a few things contributed to the stress reaction. One was that because he couldn't throw as often due to the pronator syndrome he wasn't able to build his arm up enough before reaching close to his full velocity, the second was all the NSAIDs he had to take to keep any swelling down because of the pronator syndrome (NSAIDs may have a negative impact on bone growth and healing) and the third was that they had weightlifting 4 days a week at 6:30 am all summer resulting in not enough sleep and therefore not as efficient of healing.
So unless there is an issue with pain and swelling avoid NSAIDs.
Hopefully, this time around with no need for NSAIDs, more sleep, a more structured throwing rehab, and just being a bit older and further away from his growth spurt he'll be OK from here on out. However, it can become chronic. I believe Bobby Jenks had a pin put in his elbow to solve the issue after he had a stress fracture followed by a stress reaction while he was in the Angels organization.
We're pretty sure that some of the therapy he did do at the PT caused a brachialis muscle strain that most likely contributed to the pronator syndrome.
My guess is that a few things contributed to the stress reaction. One was that because he couldn't throw as often due to the pronator syndrome he wasn't able to build his arm up enough before reaching close to his full velocity, the second was all the NSAIDs he had to take to keep any swelling down because of the pronator syndrome (NSAIDs may have a negative impact on bone growth and healing) and the third was that they had weightlifting 4 days a week at 6:30 am all summer resulting in not enough sleep and therefore not as efficient of healing.
So unless there is an issue with pain and swelling avoid NSAIDs.
Hopefully, this time around with no need for NSAIDs, more sleep, a more structured throwing rehab, and just being a bit older and further away from his growth spurt he'll be OK from here on out. However, it can become chronic. I believe Bobby Jenks had a pin put in his elbow to solve the issue after he had a stress fracture followed by a stress reaction while he was in the Angels organization.
My son was allowed to take his arm out of sling three time a day and fully extend it 10 ten times. This was to keep the tendons and muscles stretched. The Dr.'s main concern was that the tricep could pull on the bone and further displace the it. Then surgery would have been required.
Thanks again. I hope to never learn the meaning of some of the terms you guys put out there!