In May I was gracefully falling off my bike when a tree got in the way. I slammed in with my left shoulder and for a while I had some odd pains in that area. But thats fine now.

But some how I crushed my left little finger and to a lesser extent left ring finger.

They haven’t kept me from doing anything. But left little finger was very sore and swollen

The swelling has gone down. It still won’t straighten or bend forward through the full range, particulalry the end joint.

Should I be trying to make it move more. How much extra pain is it worth suffering. Will it just get better. i can mounatin bike and rock climb just fine. Well no I’m rubbish at both but thats not the fault Of my finger

Yes its been X-rayed. Apparently the X-ray was fine. Been toGP twice. Told there is no physio for a finger, surgeon won’t touch it.

I don’t want surgey but is physio no help?

What can I do to help it recover?

bump

Told there is no physio for a finger,

Your GP should probably be made aware of the British Association of Hand therapists whose membership is made up from physio and occupational therapists.

It’s quite likely that your local NHS trust will have a hand therapy unit so that could be worth a bit of investigation. Although given that you seem to have no trouble participating in activities and that your concerns mostly appear to be about the appearance of your finger you’ll probably have more luck taking the private route.

Did the exact same injury last year.
Same hand, same fingers.
I broke my smallest finger at the end knuckle and ring finger at the middle knuckle.
NHS strapped them together for 5 days then said take this off and move them about.
The little finger remains the worse, like yours doesnt quite want to go straight, occasional pain when typing.
I flex my hands the reverse way, interlocking fingers to stretch the joints, this, done regularly, seems to help loads.

It is hard to know whether to pursue it.

I certainly don’t want the little to curl up any mre as it will start to catch

I’ll google hand therapist

chop it off?

or

Tell your GP to pull their finger out (pun not intended) and do something about getting you referred.

ampthill; where abouts do you live?

Mrs mW is a hand therapist, she may know a hand therapy unit local to you. She’s asleep now, but I can ask her in the morning.

What muppewrangler said.

Even if the surgeon won’t touch it (have you actually seen the surgeon or is this just what the GP had told you? Not sure how they would know what the hand surgeons will/won’t touch) they will be able to bounce you in the direction of the hand physios to get it going again.

Presuming there is no surgery required then getting it going is most likely what it needs and the physioterrorists are the people most likely to get this done.

I am a GP and currently having hand physio! So it does exist. I’ve broken my ring finger (volar plate fracture through the joint) but the middle finger that wasn’t broken has a very similarly limited range of movement and I’m getting the same treatment on that.

It’s now 5 months since your accident so physio will find it harder to get it going but is surely worth trying. There may not be a hand unit at your local hospital but there will be one nearby. Options for referral would include
1/ hand clinic itself (you have described an ongoing flexion deformity- but with no fracture and no effect on daily activities the surgeons are unlikely to intervene)
2/ what’s been said above: referral to a more specialist physio / hand clinic. Below might help you find your “local” unit.
http://www.hand-therapy.co.uk/regional-networks/regional-networks.html

If you find out what’s available nearby, then go in with a “I’d like a referral here” attitude, the GP would have to give you a good explanation as to why that wasn’t appropriate, it may just be that the GP wasn’t aware of this service if it isn’t that local.

Thanks for the support

I think that the GP meant well but he is slightly over optimistic about his knowledge of soft tissue injuries. With my classic text book frozen shoulder he said it was an impingement.

I’m in Bedforshire

Wish I’d posted before but he convinced me that there was not much anyoone could do