Hand and palm injury, advice needed

Yesterday while pulling three finger pockets on limestone I started feeling pain in the lower right area of my palm, where I believe the tendons connect to the bone. It was a bit swollen and I did not have strength to climb further. I was pushing it a bit hard with reps on a 10b and am worried that I injured it. Does anyone have any knowledge of injuries similar to this? I'm trying to find someone knowledgable in my area as well and have been icing it periodically.

Your flexor tendons do not connect to the bone in your lower palm; they pass under some connective tissue across your wrist and then connect with your forearm muscles (which insert at your elbow).

It could be a tendon injury. But it also sounds like it could be a lumbrical injury. Here is some info. Page 2 in the case reports section offers some advice on how the individuals in this study rehabbed this injury.

rockclimbing.com has lots of threads on "palm pain." I would go search on there as well.

aerili,

I think i have strained my 4th lumbrical in my left hand and i think this is what andrew is talking about. That pdf article was mentally helpful for me because i thought i seriously screwed up my hand. I have pretty much realized that i can climb fine as long as i dont drop my pinky when pulling on a two or three finger pocket and I am going to do some light climbing at the gym tomorrow since i have been resting since saturday when I injured myself.

I understand avoiding the specific grip that caused the injury and forming a fist as rehab, but I do not know what the article means by "passively forcing
the fingers into the intrinsic minus position in order to
stretch the lumbricals"

Any other info would be greatly appreciated and I am curious if there are more people that have had this injury.

R.I.C.E- Rest Ice Compression Elevation
The best for accute injuries.
I'm no Doc, but I've been there. Soft tissue injuries (tendons and ligaments) heal slowly. Don't get crazy on it too soon, you could re-injure it easily.
My favorite solution for severe hand injuries; learn to slackline. By the time you figue that out, your hand will feel better and your balance and core strength will improve.

Cheers!

Andrew,

How were you holding the three finger pocket? If you had your hand in an open grip position with the pinky out of the pocket with the pinky curled into your palm, I think you did the same thing I did which I think is a strain of the 4th hand lumbrical. If that is the case, it is a muscle strain and not a tendon/ligament injury. I learned my lesson and from now on avoiding curling fingers not used in pockets towards my hand.

Philip Lutz wrote:I understand avoiding the specific grip that caused the injury and forming a fist as rehab, but I do not know what the article means by "passively forcing the fingers into the intrinsic minus position in order to stretch the lumbricals" Any other info would be greatly appreciated

Flex the fingers in your left hand into a "claw" position. Take your right hand and grab the top of your fingers on the left hand to hold them in this position. Then, extend your fingers at the MCP joint (base of the fingers where they connect to the hand) by pushing the fingers back toward your wrist. In essence, you are extending the MCP joints (finger-hand joints) while simultaneously holding your PIP and DIP joints in your fingers flexed.

Google some hand anatomy if you don't follow the descriptions of the joints.

Follow up

The area in my palm was stiff and tender to the touch for a few days afterwords. I iced it three times a day for a week. I planned on resting it for a few weeks, but ended up climbing more pockety limestone one week after my injury. I stuck to some easier routes and luckily did not feel anything like that again. I've since been climbing more and still have not been feeling pain.

Originally I quit the route a couple moves into feeling this pain and I think that I am alright now. I am going to be more conscious of straining hand muscles but I think everything is fine now.

My advice for anyone feeling a located pain in the hand is to quit climbing immediately and ice it constantly for a while. Take it slow when you next climb and hopefully you will also be fine.

I'm so happy that its not a chronic thing. Good luck.

I took a week off from climbing after I did it though I had to work the whole week which involved carrying boxes. I only iced the hand right after the injury. I have been climbing fine now even though I can still feel that the muscle is not completely healed. It think the best advice is to avoid dropping your pinky finger if you are pulling on a pocket because that it is ONLY time I feel that I am using that muscle.