25 Aug Do you need metatarsal surgery?
Fracturing one of your metatarsal bones is never fun, and it can sometimes be a long process to heal it fully. It may be difficult to even know if you should consider surgery or just try and rehab it and let it heal on its own. There are many different types of metatarsal fractures, and some are worse than others. The metatarsal bones are long bones in the middle of your foot, and the fractures can occur from acute injuries or from chronic stress on the bone.
The metatarsal bones are the most commonly broken bones within the foot and are usually categorized by acute fractures, sudden injury fractures, or stress fractures, which occur with repeated trauma to it. There can also be open or closed fractures; in the open fracture, the bone actually comes through the skin, which is a very serious type of fracture and would absolutely require surgery. Other types of fractures are displaced or not displaced. A displaced fracture is where the bones break and also slip out of alignment, and that requires surgery in order to put them back into alignment. The surgery required for that usually involves some type of plates or pinning of the bones so that they don’t come out of place. The factors that go into assessing your metatarsal fracture are which metatarsal is broken, which part of it is broken, and how severe the damage is. Then, based on whether it is a displaced fracture or if any other tissue is damaged because of the fracture, it will be determined if you are in need of surgery or not. If surgery is needed, you can then begin your recovery plan and get back to normal.
Breaking a bone is always a painful experience, and having to deal with potential surgery is always troublesome. That is why it is best to seek out the right professional to help you out and do the best job possible to get you back to normal and being active once again.