How to deal with a sprained ankle

Sprained ankle is usually caused by cartilage damage. If the patient cannot walk and feels particularly painful, he must go to the hospital for bone correction in time. If the bone is not corrected, it will grow crookedly and easily cause inertial sprain. It takes 100 days to heal the injured bones, and you need to drink more bone soup in your diet. So how to deal with a sprained ankle?

What should I do if I sprain my ankle?

1. Distinguish the severity of the injury. A mild ankle sprain only causes soft tissue injury, while a slightly more serious case may be a fracture of the lateral malleolus or the base of the fifth metatarsal. Even more serious cases may be bilateral ankle fractures of the medial and lateral malleolus, or even trimalleolar fractures. Mild cases can be handled by yourself, but severe cases require going to the hospital for doctor diagnosis and treatment. Therefore, it is very important to distinguish the severity of the injury.

Generally speaking, if you do not feel severe pain when moving your ankle, you can still stand and walk with ease; if the pain is not in the bones but in the muscles, it is most likely a sprain and you can treat it yourself. If you feel severe pain when moving your ankle, cannot stand or move steadily, the pain is on the bone, or you feel a sound inside the foot when you sprain it, and swelling appears quickly after the injury, especially the tenderness point is on the outer ankle or the high protruding bone in the middle of the outer foot, then it is a sign of a serious injury and you should go to the hospital for diagnosis and treatment immediately. If you are unable to go to the hospital for the time being due to limited conditions, you can temporarily follow the following methods and then go to the hospital for diagnosis and treatment as soon as possible.

2. Use hot and cold compresses appropriately. Hot compress and cold compress are both physical therapies, but their effects are completely different. Blood becomes active when it is hot and coagulates when it is cold. Therefore, when the ruptured blood vessels are still bleeding, apply cold compresses to control the progression of the injury. Hot compress can be applied only after the bleeding stops to dissipate the blood stasis around the injury.

Careful readers must be asking, how can we know if the bleeding has stopped? In principle, the boundary is 24 hours after the injury. You can also refer to the following points: First, the pain and swelling tend to stabilize and no longer continue to worsen; second, the feeling of swelling when raising and lowering the affected foot is not much different; third, the temperature of the skin at the injured area changes from being slightly higher than the normal part to being quite similar. These can all serve as a basis for the cessation of bleeding.

3. Appropriate activities. When swelling and pain develop progressively after an injury, do not stand or walk with your body weight supported. It is best to elevate the affected limb and limit any activity. When the condition becomes stable, the affected limb can be raised to perform active movements of the foot and ankle, but activities that may cause severe pain are prohibited. Wait until the swelling and pain gradually subside before you can walk around. Walk for a short time at first and then increase the amount of time gradually after you get used to it.