orthopedic wires
May 8, 2009 4:19 PM Subscribe
When is the best time to have orthopedic wires removed?
hello!
i have some orthopedic wires nearby my elbow (olecranon area) and one extending to the middle of bone called ulna, which were introduced with a surgery after an accident.
now, after two years past the operation my arm is almost in perfect condition. moreover, i can participate in many sports without thinking much of my arm. i am careful about not to fall down on my operated arm though. if i do fall or hit my elbow area somewhere, sometimes there is a moderate swell on the elbow for about one day, then it is back to normal.
i know that the wires are redundant now and i better have them removed. that is what my doctor recommends. he says there may be some complications (which is not a very descriptive explanation). however i neglect having an operation for removal along the lines of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". :)
now, should i act now and have them removed without losing further time or may i be more cool about it for thinking about them in a couple of years later? also, is there a risk of any kind during the removal procedure although healing is sound and thorough?
thank you in advance!
hello!
i have some orthopedic wires nearby my elbow (olecranon area) and one extending to the middle of bone called ulna, which were introduced with a surgery after an accident.
now, after two years past the operation my arm is almost in perfect condition. moreover, i can participate in many sports without thinking much of my arm. i am careful about not to fall down on my operated arm though. if i do fall or hit my elbow area somewhere, sometimes there is a moderate swell on the elbow for about one day, then it is back to normal.
i know that the wires are redundant now and i better have them removed. that is what my doctor recommends. he says there may be some complications (which is not a very descriptive explanation). however i neglect having an operation for removal along the lines of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". :)
now, should i act now and have them removed without losing further time or may i be more cool about it for thinking about them in a couple of years later? also, is there a risk of any kind during the removal procedure although healing is sound and thorough?
thank you in advance!
Response by poster: askmefi s not yahoo answers!
also someone may come up with a personal story which may be useful...
posted by raphael19 at 4:36 PM on May 8, 2009
also someone may come up with a personal story which may be useful...
posted by raphael19 at 4:36 PM on May 8, 2009
If you don't trust your doctor to give you good advice, seek a second opinion from another doctor, in person. Random strangers on the Internet do not have enough information to advise you about your surgery.
posted by flabdablet at 4:40 PM on May 8, 2009 [1 favorite]
posted by flabdablet at 4:40 PM on May 8, 2009 [1 favorite]
Best answer: I agree with the others, but how is this medical question so different from the other 139 posts tagged with "surgery," that we feel those questions were OK for AskMeFi, but not this one?
posted by Houstonian at 4:55 PM on May 8, 2009
posted by Houstonian at 4:55 PM on May 8, 2009
Best answer: Okay, I'll start off with IANYD. I had some major ankle reconstruction when I was in my early twenties which left a 2" staple in my foot. I used to have to get antibiotics every time I went to the dentist because when they clean your teeth, bacteria get into your bloodstream (you always bleed a bit during the process) and could *potentially* focus on foreign bodies and start doing malicious stuff. Safety precaution. Went to the doc relatively recently and asked about the staple and he said basically: "Well, you have over 20 years of bone growth over the staple and to pull it out would require the surgical equivalant of a ball peen hammer and the claw end, and it doesn't seem to be bothering you - so .. dont worry about it."
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Again, IANYD.
posted by elendil71 at 4:59 PM on May 8, 2009
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Again, IANYD.
posted by elendil71 at 4:59 PM on May 8, 2009
Best answer: Not a doctor, but a med student doing Ortho work now. We just operated on a patient who had a plate and some screws in her elbow. She had them for a couple years after a car accident and wanted them out because they were visible beneath her skin and she didn't like the way the looked. So we took 'em out. The bone had healed long ago. The only risks to her were the rare complications of surgery (bleeding/infection) and anesthegia.
The material they are made out of can stick with you for the rest of your life. The dentist/antibiotic question is an interesting one. The theory of why antibiotics are given is as elendil states, but the current literature refutes the idea and recommends that the practice be stopped.
Obviously I don't know the details of your case, so having your wires out might be a simple procedure, like this one, or it might not. But as I see it, if they aren't bothering you, there's no reason to have them taken out. If they are bothering you, there's probably very little risk in having them removed - just the cost of surgery and recovery time.
posted by Grundlebug at 5:52 PM on May 8, 2009
The material they are made out of can stick with you for the rest of your life. The dentist/antibiotic question is an interesting one. The theory of why antibiotics are given is as elendil states, but the current literature refutes the idea and recommends that the practice be stopped.
Obviously I don't know the details of your case, so having your wires out might be a simple procedure, like this one, or it might not. But as I see it, if they aren't bothering you, there's no reason to have them taken out. If they are bothering you, there's probably very little risk in having them removed - just the cost of surgery and recovery time.
posted by Grundlebug at 5:52 PM on May 8, 2009
Best answer: Coincidentally, next week I'm having removed from my tibia screws that were put there during surgery to repair a broken tibia. My doctor left the decision up to me, so I understand why you might be looking for more input on making your decision. I trust my doctor implicitly but of course I wanted to know what "everyone else" (others whose hardware was causing pain and the general feeling of fragility) was doing about the pain and limited mobility caused by the hardware.
I stumbled on a site called mybrokenleg.com containing tons of anecdotes of people in similar situations. I found the site enormously helpful when I was confined at home with my newly broken leg because it let me know that there was at any given time at least a dozen other people with the same fears and questions, even if we all had different experiences. I didn't take any of it as gospel, but I found it helpful as a general survey--a cross section--of people going through the same thing I was/am going through.
I chimed in to say this: maybe there's a similar site for people with broken arms.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 9:04 PM on May 8, 2009
I stumbled on a site called mybrokenleg.com containing tons of anecdotes of people in similar situations. I found the site enormously helpful when I was confined at home with my newly broken leg because it let me know that there was at any given time at least a dozen other people with the same fears and questions, even if we all had different experiences. I didn't take any of it as gospel, but I found it helpful as a general survey--a cross section--of people going through the same thing I was/am going through.
I chimed in to say this: maybe there's a similar site for people with broken arms.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 9:04 PM on May 8, 2009
Response by poster: thanks for the constructive & helpful answers!
posted by raphael19 at 11:26 AM on May 9, 2009
posted by raphael19 at 11:26 AM on May 9, 2009
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posted by Inspector.Gadget at 4:28 PM on May 8, 2009