Finger Pain Time Again

[gripster]

I apologize Barnacle Ben is correct. Acetaminophen is in fact a pain reliever and fever reducing medicine but it does not reduce inflammation. Sorry for the misleading information.

[Barnacle Ben]

No worries from my end, certainly didn't mean to call you out or anything. It just jumped out at me because it was the topic of that recent R&I article. I tried looking for it online but couldn't find it. It's worth taking a look at though if you happen upon the print edition.

[Crankmas]

kinda related, read in a mag yesterday about alternating hot and cold water cycles during post workout showers, 3-4 cycles is great but 5-6 would be even more beneficial, the last cycle should be cold- info came form Mark Twight- nuff said... noticed strain like pain last saturday in right ring finger and had mild swelling & soreness all week - plan to tape for climbing this weekend- another interesting thing about fingers is the lack of fatty tissue means they don't numb well for being sutured so don't cut your fingers up

[khrockhound]

not that this is the case here, but after several years of finger pain, (mostly tip joints), being treated for arthritis with vioxx and nsaids, all finally coalesced into un-diagnosed lyme disease. treated for same, disease gone, lots of little and big pains gone also.

[toad857]

taping, icing, standing on your head for 35 minutes before the send.... cognitive effect aside, it's all hear-say/unsubstantiated/anecdotal evidence. your body is a fine machine--it has mechanisms that tell you when you're doing something wrong. so listen to it. (or more appropriately, don't IGNORE it)

we're led to believe there's a pill, or a quick fix, or something you can purchase for any problem. well, there's not.

[Redpoint]

I wonder what redpoint has to say on the matter?

I have suffered from a few finger injuries, and the only thing that made them stop was stretching my fingers before I warm up. I bend them back and hold for 20 seconds, which is like the forearm stretch, only I keep my arm at my side which allows me to bend them further. Next I bend them forward by making a fist and squeezing it with my other hand for 20 seconds (I learned this from some climbers training website), here is my example: http://i50.tinypic.com/33vdh7o.jpg I have to stretch my thumb separately, and now that I have been doing that the aches in my hand between my thumb and my pointer finger have gone away as well (stupid pinches).

Well guess what, today was the first time I have climbed in months without stretching my fingers(I forgot), and now I have a pinky injury in my left hand and an ache in my right hand between my thumb and pointer finger. That ache used to always show up in my left hand, and now it just so happens to be in my right hand. Well I took some Ibuprofen and now my right hand feels great, but my pinky still hurts. I wonder how long this injury will last for. I was going to climb in the gym tomorrow too, but I know that I shouldn't. Speaking of which, some climber at the gym said "just don't climb with your pinky, that's what I do with my broken one", and he shows me his crooked pinky. I didn't want to get all preachy on him and tell him about how it could prolong the injury, possibly forever, or it might affect him later on in life if he keeps climbing without letting it heal, and so believe it or not I just kept my mouth shut.

Something I read at a climbing training website after I had my worst finger injury so far: making huge moves on to crimpers while bouldering without warming up is the number one cause of finger injury while climbing. It just so happens that the worst finger injury I had was from doing just that, and I had to take 2 weeks off to let in heal.

Doing lots of research on the web might be a good idea. If you are too lazy to do that, you could always post this on Rockclimbing.com, and most likely you will get a lot more replies and advice there.

Of course the best advice would probably come from your doctor. Hopefully it's not permanent, and if you lay off of it, it will heal. Good luck.