SnoTap Medical: Clay's Complicated Thumb

It is frightening how badly Green Bay Packers games are becoming much like the movie Groundhog’s Day with Bill Murray.  Wake up, watch the Packer game and the camera inevitably shows another player exiting the field to the locker room.  For the second consecutive game, Clay Matthews left the game early with an injury. The camera showed him running off the field and I finally exhaled, thinking he cramped up and needed fluids. However, I was terribly wrong.  The Packers announced he had broken his thumb and will be out for quite some time.

When injuries happen, you take to Twitter to be miserable with other Packer fans. This led me to go on a mini Twitter rant talking about how the hand and wrist are murky when it comes to injuries, treatments and time missing.  Well, it turns out my rant justified itself as the type of fracture Matthews suffered, Bennett’s fracture,  is the most common type of thumb fracture. It’s located at the base of the thumb where it articulates with the carpals and usually involves some sort of dislocation.

This type of injury does not always require surgery; obviously it depends on the severity of the dislocation between the first metacarpal (thumb bone) and the carpal bone it articulates with (trapezium bone). In some cases, a thumb cast is all that is really necessary, but in most severe cases pins are placed to connect the first metacarpal to the trapezium. The bones NEED to be stabilized if severe enough because if they are allowed to heal in a displaced position, it will decrease the integrity of the thumb joint and limit its mobility and usage.  And in all cases a cast is required for four to six weeks.  My conjecture is that Clay’s Bennett Fracture was pretty severe especially since they went ahead and performed surgery on Monday, a day after the game.

Picture 1: Fracture before everything is put back together.
Picture 2: Pins going through first metacarpal to trapezieum

Why is this injury so devastating? Well partly because of the treatment is quite radical and also due to ADLs (activities of daily living).   The thumb constitutes for 50% of OVERALL hand function.  Think about that, 50% of what you do with your hands your thumb is involved, and if that does not seem like a lot go to your kitchen, take a knife, and cut off your thumb.  Then tell me if you think 50% is not that much (Ed. Note SnoTap does not endorse self-mutilation – CT . It is a huge pet peeve of mine when fans piss and moan about a player not playing though an injury.  I guaran-ass-tee these are the same fans are ones who call in sick to work when they have a fuckin’ head cold.

-Charlie.