After spending five weeks grounded from running with little relief of my left tibia pain, I finally agreed to get some real imaging studies. I got an X-ray last week that showed absolutely nothing, which is somewhat good, but it is impossible to see an early stress fracture. So I finally got an MRI. The good news is, I don't have a stress fracture. The bad news is I still have really bad shin splints despite all of my treatment modalities. I wear a bone stimulator for 10 hours a day, which means I have to take the charger to work with me when I am on call. I also am now wearing a cam boot to take some of the stress off of the leg. I would put myself on crutches, but I walk somewhere between 5 and 10 miles at work on any given day and my arms would give out (not an exaggeration: I used to wear a pedometer at work and logged a 12.5 mile day on Christmas in 2004).
As for the MRI shown, that is me. If you look at the tibia with the R on it, you will see nice normal dark gray signal within the marrow. On the left, it lights up like a Christmas tree. All of that white stuff is water, which is a signal for inflammation. The picture on the right is my tibia looking from the side.
So good news, I will not snap my tibia if I try to run again. The bad news is it will probably still hurt like hell. I have a tri coming up in 4 weeks. If all else fails, I'll walk.
No comments:
Post a Comment