Strained A1 Pulley

During a gym session I grabbed a hold weird and strained my A1 pulley. I have heard that I should stay off it for a week. Are there any other rehab tips? When can I start hangboarding and climbing again?

Do yourself a favor and stay off of it for at least that week. Your other fingers will try to compensate for the damaged one if you climb, which may injure a different pulley. I attempted to climb through some pulley strain and ended up with A1 & A2 ruptures in 2 fingers that had me on the sidelines for about a year.

I saw an orthopedist and a physical therapist. Both didn't really tell me more than the information contained in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWZQMnlHEbg. Other than that, heating my hands twice a day was very beneficial. Fingers don't get great circulation so the heat brings the blood you need to heal. My healing was also accelerated when I moved into a job that required less typing, which is an unfortunate concern for the modern climber.

Unless you are getting imaging of the hand, there's no real way to tell when it is safe to climb/hangboard. Wait until most of the pain is gone and then really pay attention to your fingers when in use.

Good luck and take care of yourself!

Yeah take time off! I kept climbing and now about 2 years later I finally started a full rehab period. My was the A2 but same type of issue. Black Diamond has really good tips on their site with videos that have rice buckets, hang boarding etc... I’ve been doing it religiously for the past 2 months and I’m climbing at nearly the same level with little to no pain,this is the 1st time I haven’t had finger pain in about 2 years so something is working. Good luck!

I've had pulley injuries and found light hangboarding to be very helpful to getting back stronger.

Here is an interesting article about finger rehab and hangboarding.

https://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/experience-story?cid=esther-smith-nagging-finger-injuries