Injury Question...

SomeoneSomeplace

So it's a long story about why I can't see a doctor for a bit but I have a medical question for you all, maybe someone with a background in physical therapy can help me out. I know you can't diagnose me I'm just trying to figure out what might be going on...

Around this time last year I started having ankle pain. I was diagnosed with subtalor arthritis resulting from a break on my growth plate when I was 14. It was annoying but a very manageable level of pain. Fast forward to this past summer, I'd gone to the gym that morning like normal, slight pain, nothing out of the ordinary. Then that night pain in my heel/Achilles Tendon woke me up. It got worse and worse over the week to the point where the pain was so excruciating any movement of my foot was unbearable.

When I went to the doctor I was in too much pain for him to even examine it. He put me in a walking boot for about two months. I got special insoles for shoes and everything was fine, until a couple weeks ago. The pain started out mild and has been getting worse and worse, especially as I've been on my feet at work. It's a similar pain as to what I was going through before... but not nearly as bad. The worst pain occurs when I move my foot up and down, and I can't walk without limping. Originally the doctor diagnosed me as having partially torn my achilles tendon based on my symptoms. However, if that's what it was, it doesn't seem like I'd have pain several months after it healed.

But I do. I got a stomach virus about three weeks ago, so that kept me out of the gym. Then I started having this pain, just remembering how awful it was before, made me too afraid to go the gym until I see a doctor. Point is I haven't been to the gym in three weeks and the pain started two weeks ago, so I doubt it's from anything at the gym. I was thinking tendonitis was a possibility but I've had that before in my knee and this is a very different kind of pain, plus I haven't been to the gym in three weeks, so it's not like I've been putting a lot of stress on it. I am just really clueless about what could be causing this pain.

While it isn't as bad as it was before, it is continuing to get worse and it cold reach that level again. I have a high pain tolerance but the pain I was in was literally unbearable. So it's far from being anything minor. It's just VERY strange because BOTH times the pain came on VERY suddenly.

For the record I am on my feet A LOT. I'm an aide in a special needs classroom and I spent almost all my time in classrooms with students walking around and standing up.

ebahde

I am an athletic trainer, who works for a physical therapy company. This is what I would suggest trying.

The physical therapy company that I work for (as well as many of our competitors) offer complimentary injury screens. This involves either a physical therapist or athletic trainer evaluating your injury and telling you what they believe to be the problem, giving you some rehab exercises that should help the problem, and then they usually give you an orthopeadic physician’s information and they tell you that if you don’t see an improvement in about 2 weeks that you should probably see a physician. Obviously this can differ based on the actual injury if they suspect that it is really serious and need immediate attention then they will recommend that you see an orthopeadic right away. Now the company that I work for is in Chicago, but I am sure that there a physical therapy companies that do something similar in your area. Companies that do this tend to big larger outpatient PT companies. This is a great process because if the reason you can’t see a physician for a while is due to insurance/financial reasons these screens are completely free (we don’t even take your insurance info).

Anyway hope that this helps.

As far as what is actually wrong its obviously hard to tell without actually examining you, it could be anything from a flare up of the arthritis to a re-injury of your previous partial achilles tear (it doesn't always take a major traumatic injury, could be a simple as taking a bad step, slipping on a stair, etc... that causes a small re-injury)

I hope you feel better soon!