What Kind of Ankle Injury Do You Have?

Let’s imagine you’re Tom Cruise for a moment. You’re accustomed to performing your own movie stunts, leaping between buildings on the set of Mission: Impossible 6, when suddenly you make a miscalculation. You’re injured and you limp off the set with a broken ankle. 

All of us, daring stunt actors or not, are prone to injuries and chronic pains of the ankle. Let’s take a closer look at some.

Sprain

An ankle sprain is one of the most common injuries we treat here at Affiliated Foot & Ankle Center in Howell, New Jersey. It’s an injury to the ligaments that attach one ankle bone to another. When you twist your ankle, you can stretch ligaments way farther than they’re built for. That extra stretch is called a sprain. The worst kind of sprain is when you go beyond the extra stretch to the point of actually tearing the ligament.

Fracture

A fracture is a broken bone. Pain, tenderness, and swelling in your ankle may mean only a stress fracture - a crack in a bone’s surface. The same symptoms could indicate a more complete fracture, where the break is deeper into the bone. Always consult our board-certified podiatrists, Dr. Samantha Boyd, Dr. Hal Ornstein, Dr. Joseph Saka, and Dr. Katy Statler as soon as possible after an ankle injury to determine if it’s a sprain, stress fracture, or general fracture.

Osteoarthritis

As we age, the protective cartilage between the many joints in our ankle can wear down. Without cartilage’s protective cushioning, bones crunch against other bones. That’s why osteoarthritis can be so painful. Our ankles are subject to other kinds of arthritis as well, such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and post-traumatic arthritis - damage to the cartilage due to a traumatic injury.

Damage to the Achilles tendon

A tendon is a rope-like tissue that connects bone to muscle. The Achilles tendon begins at your heel, runs past your ankle, and connects to your calf muscle. The Achilles tendon is subject to inflammation (tendonitis) in competitive athletes and in those who take on too much activity too soon. It can also tear, either partially or completely.

Our Monmouth County podiatry office has only one mission: to successfully treat all your foot and ankle injuries - sprains, fractures, inflammation, and the aches and pains of arthritis - with medications, physical therapy, braces, splints, exercises, and even foot and ankle surgery when necessary. Call on our expertise at (732) 905-1110 or contact us online.