Get back your mobility with Sacral Fracture Treatment

Dealing with a sacral fracture can be overwhelming, but effective treatment options are available to help you recover.

Whether caused by trauma or stress, sacral fractures can lead to debilitating pain and mobility issues, affecting your daily life.

Fortunately, advancements in sacral fracture treatment offer hope for a smoother recovery for you now.

To understand your treatment options better, learn about innovative treatments, recovery strategies, and how to regain mobility and comfort.

What is a Sacral Fracture?

Before you understand a sacral fracture, you should know what a sacrum is.

A sacrum is a wedge-shaped bone at the back of your pelvis between your hip bones. 

To make this bone, five vertebrae in your spine fuse. The sacrum and the hip bones together make the pelvis a sturdy ring and strong ligaments bind them together. Fracture in the sacrum means, damage to the other bones in the pelvis and the ligaments. 

What Are the Different Types of Sacral Fractures?

This fracture has different types:

Low-energy sacral fractures

Elderly individuals or those with weakened bones can suffer from this fracture, often due to osteoporosis. Low-energy sacral fractures occur from minimal trauma. 

High-energy sacral fractures

High-energy sacral fractures happen due to trauma. The person may sustain an injury in a car accident or may have fallen from a height to get such a trauma. 

Sacral stress fracture

Runners who are doing too many activities without proper training are at risk of this fracture. It can also happen to a woman who has just delivered a baby and had some kind of bone loss during the pregnancy. 

Sacral Avulsion Fracture: 

Common in athletes, these fractures occur when a tendon or ligament pulls a fragment of bone away from the sacrum due to forceful muscle contractions.

Sacral Compression Fracture: 

This can happen due to a traumatic injury, such as a fall or car accident, resulting in the sacral vertebrae being compressed or crushed.

What are the symptoms of sacral fractures?

So what makes you think that you have a sacral fracture?

You need to understand the symptoms first and then consult a doctor. To help you out, here are some of the symptoms of sacral fracture:

• Severe lower back or buttocks pain
• Moving, especially standing up or sitting down, can make the pain worse.
• Walking might become a challenge as the pain can radiate down your legs.
• Your lower back or sacrum area might be tender to the touch.
• Numbness, tingling, or weakness in your legs or feet could be a red flag.
• In severe cases, sacral fractures can mess with your bowel or bladder control.
• Look out for bruising or swelling around the lower back

If you have any or a few of these symptoms, do not hesitate to consult your doctor. 

How to Diagnose Sacral Fracture?

As said above, doctors often fail to diagnose sacral fractures. Either they are diagnosed late or they go undiagnosed. If you have back pain, there can be many causes behind it like muscle weakness or tightness, joint inflammation, etc. 

To diagnose a sacral fracture, doctors need to take a few steps:

• Firstly, they rely on your history – did you have a fall, a sports injury, or perhaps a car accident? 
• Then comes the physical examination, where tenderness or deformities around the sacrum might be clues.
• Next, X-rays are often the first step, capturing a snapshot of your sacrum. 
• If there are still doubts, they may call in reinforcements like CT scans or MRI scans, which provide more detailed views of the bones and surrounding tissues.

All these steps help doctors form a complete picture and determine the type and severity of the sacral fracture, guiding them toward the best treatment plan.

Remember, when a sacral fracture goes untreated and undiagnosed, it can result in neurological symptoms and urinary, rectal, and sexual dysfunctions. 

How is Sacral Fracture Treatment performed?

Here are some that you should remember when it comes to sacral fracture treatment:

• If your fracture is due to a low-energy fall or stress fracture (tiny crack in the bone), your doctor will recommend rest and pain relief medications. but you need to stay mobile if it doesn’t cause extreme pain.
• Your healthcare provider may prescribe calcium and vitamin D medications if it is a stress fracture or a low-energy fall.
• If your pelvis has been damaged by the fracture, your doctor may recommend surgery. To stabilize it, they may use surgical screws, bone cement, or plates.
• If your cauda equina (the collection of nerves at the end of your spinal cord) is damaged, your doctor may recommend surgery.

MedicoExperts has a panel of orthopedics specialists who can help you make an informed decision from the comfort of your home. 

Final thoughts

Consulting the doctor on time can save you from the pain of the sacral fracture. Usually, it takes 8-12 weeks to heal from sacral fractures. 

Your healing time and the type of treatment you undergo completely depend on the type of accident or injury you have. 

MedicoExperts can help you connect with some of the best orthopedists in India. We have served more than 10,000 satisfied patients. Through our global virtual hospital, we make it possible for you to get quality healthcare services at affordable costs. 

So, don’t hesitate to contact us, we are one click away from you!

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References

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7265089/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24981900/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3279068/