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Ed Yeates ReportingA concerned Consumer Product Safety Commission worries about the 27-thousand plus snowboarders who are now coming to ER's for wrist injuries every snow season. The number is even more staggering if you add skateboarders to the list. How about 50-thousand plus wrist injuries yearly, if you add good weather skateboarding to that five months of snowboarding.
Twenty-six year old Ben Layne broke his wrist snowboarding about two months ago. He's now at the end of a three to four week rehab time. This is not his first wrist injury, nor will it be his last.
Ben Layne, Avid Snowboarder: "Your first response is to put your hands down behind you, and I don't think anything is going to change that."
Ben's break was only a small fracture, so his down time is minimal. But Dr. Laird Swensen says another patient's wrist injury was more serious, requiring a plate to hold things in place.
Dr. Swensen: "The plate acts as a buttress, keeping the bone in segments. These are actually locking screws which lock into the plate and form a strut to help hold the fragments in place while they heal."
After three months the patient is back to work, but still limited in what he can do.
Again the nature of boarding - whether on skates or snow - is to break your fall with the hands and wrists. When Ben isn't snowboarding, he's working at the Orthopedic Specialty Hospital as an exercise specialist. He knows boarders won't quit, so his advice...
Ben Layne: “Just learn to strengthen the wrist and learn how to fall, and wear protection. Always wear protective gear.”
Part of that protective gear is wrist guards, something Dr. Swensen says boarders now should never be without.
Dr. Swensen: “Certain studies suggest you can decrease wrist injuries by 50 percent by just wearing the wrist guard. So I think that should be the take home lesson."
Wrist guards, helmets, and as Ben tells snowboarders, try to stay in the powder and off the hard stuff.
