Hand and wrist pain are common after car accidents. Injuries to the hands and wrists occur when bracing yourself, when airbags deploy, or when the force of the crash causes your arm to collide with a hard surface inside the vehicle.
A chiropractor can assess, diagnose, and treat many causes of hand and wrist pain and provide supportive care for other injuries. Chiropractors provide noninvasive, drug-free care for car accident injuries and other causes of pain in the hands, wrists, elbows, and shoulders.
Common Causes of Hand and Wrist Pain After Car Accident
Hands and wrists often take a beating in collisions. They can suffer a wide range of injuries that lead to pain, inflammation, and limited range of motion. The causes could include:
- Fractures: While we cannot treat hand and wrist fractures directly, we do provide supportive care, pain management, and physical therapy to help you reduce your symptoms and heal.
- Sprains and Strains: Ligaments, tendons, and muscles in the hand and wrist could be forced beyond their usual range of motion in a crash, especially if you braced yourself or had your hand on the wheel. This injury causes pain, inflammation, and limited movement in the affected area.
- Bruising and Contusions: When your hand or arm slams into something inside the car during a crash, it can cause significant bruising. This kind of impact leads to disabling pain and tenderness until it heals.
- Dislocations: The bones in the wrist or hand can dislocate in a crash. Dislocations cause severe pain, inflammation, and instability. You do not want to learn what happens if you leave a dislocated finger untreated. Our chiropractors can often help stabilize a joint and rebuild stability with noninvasive means. Some dislocations require surgery, but we provide rehabilitation.
- Nerve Damage: Car accidents can cause nerve damage in the arm, hand, or wrist. This can cause pain, numbness, tingling, weakness, and even disability.
- Joint Injuries: An accident can damage the joints in the hand and wrist, causing pain, swelling, and reduced range of motion. Treatment can restore strength, movement, and flexibility.
Sometimes, arm pain can come from injuries elsewhere in the body. You might have an overuse injury of your hand because of a shoulder injury or have pain radiating down your arm from whiplash. Our chiropractors will assess your whole body for injuries, ensuring we identify and treat the underlying issue as well as manage your symptoms.
Each Patient Receives a Personalized Plan to Address Their Hand and Wrist Pain
Getting appropriate medical care after your car accident is essential. You want a doctor to diagnose the cause of your hand and wrist pain and provide an effective treatment plan. Working with a chiropractor to do this ensures you receive an honest assessment and a drug-free, noninvasive treatment plan whenever possible.
During your initial appointment, you will undergo a physical examination, X-rays, and other assessments to diagnose the cause of your pain. Then, your practitioner will prescribe a personalized plan that includes chiropractic care and physiotherapy. This plan is designed to treat and fully rehabilitate your injured arm, wrist, or hand.
How Do Chiropractors Approach Car Accident Injuries?
According to the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FHSMV), more than 250,000 people were hurt in Florida car accidents in 2022. Many of these likely required only outpatient assessment, treatment, and care. A chiropractor might have been a good option for those who wished to manage their pain and other symptoms without medications or invasive treatments.
The goal of chiropractors and physical therapists is to treat patients holistically, addressing the underlying cause as well as treating their symptoms. They want patients to recover and avoid future injuries. The focus of chiropractic care is on rebuilding strength and range of motion with every treatment plan.
Hand and wrist pain can occur after almost any type of incident or accident. In addition to collisions, chiropractors can treat pain in the upper extremities from:
- Work-related accidents
- Slips and fall accidents
- Motorcycle accidents
- Bicycle and pedestrian vs. car collisions
- Sports and recreation injuries
- Boat and pool injuries
If you are suffering from pain following a car accident, a chiropractic care facility near you may be able to help.
Prescribed Treatments for Wrist and Hand Pain After a Car Accident
When a patient comes to us with hand and wrist pain after a crash, our chiropractor prescribes a personalized plan to address their pain, inflammation, limitations, and underlying injury. This plan usually includes a combination of treatments, such as:
- Joint Adjustments: Chiropractors can manually adjust the shoulder, elbow, wrist, and joints in the hand to ensure correct alignment. This adjustment will reduce pain and improve range of motion.
- Soft Tissue Therapy: Therapists can perform numerous techniques to reduce muscle tension, increase blood flow, ease inflammation, and help soft tissues heal. These techniques include massage therapy, myofascial release, ultrasound therapy, and trigger point therapy.
- Electrical Stimulation: Therapists perform complementary therapies to help manage pain and improve circulation, allowing patients to undergo treatment and healing without using painkillers. Electrical stimulation and cold and heat therapy are two common examples of this.
- Rehabilitation: Chiropractors prescribe specific exercises that help patients recover fully from their injuries. The goal is to strengthen the affected muscles, improve flexibility, restore function, and prevent future re-injury.
- Splinting or Bracing: Sometimes, the use of splints or braces on an injured hand or wrist might provide support and reduce strain on the injured hand or wrist during healing. Kinesiology tape therapy might be used instead.
- Stretching: Stretching and other physical therapy exercises might help improve flexibility, reduce stiffness, and restore the full range of motion in the injured hand and wrist.
Call the Naples Community Injury Center for Your Initial Intake Exam
The Naples Community Injury Center team has more than 60 years of combined experience treating car accident injuries like yours. We can assess your symptoms, diagnose your injury, and prescribe a personalized treatment plan for your hand and wrist pain.
Contact us now for your initial appointment with our chiropractors.
