How To Cope With A Broken Toe
If you have broken your toe you should seek medical attention. A broken toe does not need to have severe consequences. However, you must ensure that you go to your podiatrist and get the toe evaluated. Preparing for your examination is important. This means that you need to have all your facts ready to tell your doctor about how the injury happened. Here's a closer look at how broken toes are often treated.
Give Details
As mentioned before you will need to give details about what has happened to your podiatrist. Tell your doctor about how the injury took place. You also need to tell them about your medical history and about any medications that you are taking. This will help your doctor tell what kind of medications you can get for your injury. In case you have severe pain.
Usually, the pain medication that your doctor recommends for a broken toe is one that you can get over the counter. However, for more severe pain your doctor may prescribe something a bit stronger.
Treatments
The most common treatment for a broken tool is immobilization. This can be done in several ways and it helps the toe knit itself back together. One method that is often employed is buddy taping. Your doctor will usually tape the injured toe to the toe next to it. The uninjured tool will serve as a splint for the injured toe.
Your doctor will put some gauze in between the toes to prevent any skin irritation from occurring due to the rubbing of one toe against the other. Sometimes a cast may be used to hold fragments of the bone together if the injury is severe enough.
Surgery May Be Necessary
Hopefully, when you have a broken toe it will not be severe enough to require surgery. However, if you do require surgery your doctor will use plates and pins to put the bones of the toe in their correct position so that it can heal. Once your toe has begun to heal your doctor may ask you to wear special shoes that have a stiff bottom but are soft on the top.
This will prevent unnecessary movements from the toe and get it to heal a lot faster. These types of shoes also help prevent any squeezing of the toe if there is swelling after surgery. Your doctor will tell you when you can stop wearing these shoes.
Visit a podiatrist to learn more.