I have been told I have a stress fracture in my lower femur (diagnosed by
MRI), but the majority of my pain is in my knee. How is this? I run track and
cross-country at my high school. I have been told I will not be able to run
until the summer. Do you think this is accurate? Oh yeah, this problem started
in November of 2002 and I began to run about a month ago. Now it has flared up
again because it never completely healed. I was off 13 weeks which I was told
was plenty of healing time, but it apparently was not enough for me. Could my
bones have a density problem even though I am a healthy male runner, or is it
just that this fracture may take extra time to heal? In other words, why has it
not healed? I think I may have started back too quickly. One more question,
would you recommend a calcium supplement? Thanks for your time!
Mitchell, first, all pain is referred. It is typical for a stress fracture to show up as pain quite distant from the site of the fracture. When you have a fracture, you need to anticipate 6 weeks to heal, then because you have been non-weight bearing (on crutches), your leg is actually weaker than it was when you hurt it, so you need to allow time for strength training to re-build your muscle mass. Perhaps you missed this step? So 6 weeks for the bone to heal, then 6-10 weeks for re-building strength and endurance. Bone density is good question to follow-up on. You will need a DEXA scan to know your real bone density. If you eat green vegetables, drink milk, eat cheese, and sardines, you should have enough calcium in your body as young as you are, but again, you can check this out with your MD.
Be patient!
Neil
