20/03/2021
Approximately 60% of ankle sprains and fractures involve the talar dome and yet they are the most misdiagnosed and ignored. Talar dome lesions can take weeks, months, even years to show on an x-ray. If an Osteochondral Lesion (OCL) is not suspected or ignored, patients presenting exaggerated pain that is disproportionate to the injury, after conservative treatment, are often misdiagnosed as having chronic (pain lasting longer than 6 months) or neurological diseases.
Peroneal tendonitis is often a secondary injury to an OCL. Peroneal tendon subluxation will mimic nerve pain, i.e. shooting pain like electric shocks. A few symptoms used for a chronic/neurological disease, based on my experience, include:
- Leg atrophy due to immobilisation with a walking boot. You lose approximately 30% within two weeks of immobilisation due to a boot or cast.
- Extra sensitivity to touch due to tendon and bone injury. Stress, subluxation, or ruptures, due to ankle instability, may cause your tendons to spasm. Diagnosis of tendonitis to the peroneal tendons may cause your leg, foot, and toes to spasm. This may cause bruising and deformities to your foot, toes, and ankle.
- Ischemia/Night Ischemia. Blood flow to the bone and surrounding tissue may be affected, causing your ankle/foot to feel ice cold. Pain is worse at night. Elevation and cold makes it worse. The area affected is hard to warm and the cold feels like it's bone deep. Chronic ischemia can cause necrosis of the talus, tarsometatarsal joints (known as the Lisfranc joint), and the metatarsals (your toes).
- Your range of motion when manually moved will appear normal. Weight bearing is limited or impossible. If walking is tolerated, you'll have a "catch", "lock", or a "stop" feeling at the push off in your step. If you have been or are in physical therapy, you'll often be told your missing 10% in you gait. The joint will swell with activity, a deep ache within the joint during activity and rest, the joint may feel loose, and while resting you may the joint slip or shift.
- Sympathetic nerve blocks temporary open affected blood vessels, temporarily elevating the Ischemia.
There are other symptoms that I have and continue to experience. I'm going to share my experience one doctor at a time.
I am not a doctor. I can not offer medical or professional advice.
I am a researcher. After reading countless articles in peer reviewed, authored by doctors and specialist, and publicly published by the National Institute of Health (NIH) and National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), I argued and fought against my chronic/neurological diagnoses.
Doctors that diagnosis chronic/vascular/neurological diseases, essentially blackball patients with Talar dome lesions. After being doctor shamed by 5 doctors, being seen by 2 pain management doctors -one a physiatrist that sent me back to an ankle/foot specialist, enduring 2 sympathetic nerve blocks, being forced to resign from my job, losing my insurance, and my ability to live my life...
One month after being forced to resign (Feb. 19th), I'm finally going to tell my story. I'm going to expose the doctors that ignored their own diagnostic testing and share the contridictions between the doctors notes and their diagnoses. In telling my story, I'm going to share my research, along with my living nightmare, and I hope it helps others that are like me. You are not crazy. And neither am I.
