Do you think my son's wrist is broken?

[WilkinsonL]

My son is 11 and is in Year 6. He plays football at lunch.

He fell over and was rolling around on the floor telling his friend to get a teacher. She came over - not a teacher, but the lunch assistant. Told him to get up, he got up and she asked if he was okay now and he said that his wrist was hurting. She said he should go to medical. He goes off to medical with his friend. The lady in medical is the receptionist, but she has done a first aid course. She was touching it and was asking if he could feel her and he said yes, but it was hurting. She said "I think you'll be fine" and he said no but it hurts and can't move it properly, she said that's why happens after an injury and that if he broke it he would be in absolute tears, so she knows it isn't

He was sent to his classroom, his teacher even said it looked a little odd and my son said that he had already been to medical and she said it was fine, so his teacher just left it. I got him at the end of the day and he was okay, gave him some pain relief and seemed alright, he said it was still a bit sore. I suggested to the medical lady (as I went to the office when I got him as his teacher gave me a medical slip, which means there is a recorded accident) that maybe I should get it X-Rayed... She told me to definitely not worry about that and it will just be wasting A and E time and resources as he clearly isn't in distress. I'm not medically trained at all. So I did take her word for it... He has woken up today, with it looking a little bit bruised and not able to properly move it. I was going to take him, but his dad said that I shouldn't worry because school said it was fine. He has been okay today, he has just been watching films, not moving it, but now I'm not sure if I should just go against everyone and take him???

What do you think...? Sorry if I'm coming across a bit stupid, I have never dealt with a broken bone before! He has never even needed to go to a and e.

[Bigfam]

Your poor son hope he's OK.

Same thing happened to my dd1 last year with her foot, when she was 6. She fell over at school and when I picked her up she couldn't walk properly (would only put weight on the outside of her foot) apparently because she didn't "cry enough" and only complained about it hurting a bit they thought she was fine
She ended up in a cast for 7 weeks.
The school grudgingly apologised

[lougle]

Well done.

[Doublejeopardy]

To be fair to school I broke my wrist, went to a&e the next day they said no it's fine I moaned all weekend and the hospital ran in Monday to say actually we've checked the X-rays and it is fractured.

Never let my DM forget that one

[YorkieDorkie]

Hmmm at the very least he should have had ice on it. Receptionist first aiders aren't medically trained and deal with a lot of fussy kids claiming to have something wrong. I'm not surprised she tried to get him back to class. It's a shame that things like this aren't taken more seriously. I little boy in my class broke his arm on the playground but couldn't describe what was wrong properly. I thought he was telling me his eczema was hurting so I packed his arm with ice packs to try and stop the irritation. His mum told me the next day that his arm had blown up hours later and it was broken! Thankfully she thought I was wonderful because the doctor had "praised the teacher" who packed his arm with cold compresses . I felt pretty bad. I'm a strong advocate for all people working with kids to be first aid trained to avoid things like this.

[AugustaFinkNottle]

The school needs to send their receptionist on a better first aid course. Her view that the wrist couldn't be broken because he wasn't upset enough was ridiculous and potentially very dangerous.

[ScarlettDarling]

So glad you got him sorted, he'll be right as rain in no time.

I wouldn't kick up a stink with the first aider though. Even you as his mother couldn't decide whether it required a visit to a and e, sometimes it's really hard.

[tiddlyipom]

Well I agree with All the dwarves.
I would have taken him straight to A&E, not waited until the next day, after asking some randoms on the internet.
I would also be speaking to the school, they ought to have erred on the side of caution and had him checked out my a medical professionalm or ohoned you to come and get him checked out yourself .

[tiddlyipom]

Sorry,
Professional and phoned

[3yearoldlittleboyandgirl]

Why are people getting sarcastic with the OP? There's no need.

[IslaSinga]

Definitely take your son in to school on Monday and speak to the head teacher about this - it is not good!

[P1nkP0ppy]

I'm another with tiddlyipom, it baffles me why too op didn't go straight to A&E if she suspected it was fractured.........

[MilkOfAmnesia]

FFS why is everyone laying into the OP all of a sudden?

the reason (I assume) she asked a load of 'randoms on the internet' is because we are constantly told A and Es are overwhelmed with time wasters and she has has already had someone tell her its not broken and doesn't need to worry.
Of course she's going to second guess herself and look for another opinion.
Very simple really.

[bumbleymummy]

Your poor boy! :( Definitely complain.

[Skiptonlass]

Definitely complain. A non medical person should always err on the side of caution and refer on if it's not clear or if the parent is worried. An over confident but under skilled first aided is more of a danger than a help!
Wrists are tricky because breaks can be very subtle. They always need looking at because of the way the structure of wrist is - it's easy to fracture the small bones and they don't have a great blood supply. A poorly healed break can easily result in nerve damage or bone necrosis.
If you suspect a break then always go to minor injuries (if they have X ray) or Aand E. You're not wasting their time. Especially where a child is concerned.

[Shadow1986]

I was going to say definitely yes! My daughters arm looked the same when she broke her wrist falling off a slide at soft play when she was 18 months old - the first aider there wiggled it about and said they thought she was fine! I decided to go a&e anyway and it was broken!

Hope you son recovers well.

[LoveFromUs]

Instead of being on here asking questions you should have taken your child to the doctors/hospital

[P1nkP0ppy]

I'm not laying into op, I just cannot understand someone consulting an Internet forum when suspecting someone has a fractured wrist!
It hardly going to be time wasting, is it? And to ask c30 hours after the fall when the child awoke unable to move it does seem somewhat odd to me.

[LoveFromUs]

P1nkP0ppy exactly, if I suspected my son had a broken risk, posting on an Internet forum wouldn't cross my mind.

And people are laying into her because what she had done is basically "neglect" she paid Mumsnet more attention than her own child.

[WicksEnd]

God leave the OP alone. We have it drummed into us not to waste NHS resources so it can make us doubt ourselves whether to go.
She asked for advice, maybe she's had bad experiences in the past which made her reluctant. Leave her be.

[MatildaTheCat]

We had a very similar situation once
Ds injured his wrist playing rugby at school. Teacher looked at it and said he thought it was ok. It didn't hurt that much and ds carried on with his day. I looked at it and wasn't sure so we went for an X-ray and yes, it was a fracture.

I didn't occur to me to complain. No harm came of it. Ds told his teacher who, no doubt learned fro it. Too much complaining about people doing their best. If there had been an adverse consequence fine but the OP wasn't even sure it needed an X-ray which is why she came here.

Mention it to school by all means but please don't go in all guns blazing. It's that kind of stuff that makes schools stop football/ playground games altogether.

[Amy214]

I was sobbing my eyes out when i broke my arm and wrist (at the same time) but after 10 mins the pain stopped and it wasnt sore it just looked wonky. I would take him to get an x ray for peace of mind.

[mummyto2monkeys]

Your poor boy, my eight year old broke his arm in two places falling off the monkey bars when we were on holiday last year. We were staying at Crieff Hydro and they had a first aider come over straight away. It was packed in ice, put in a sling and we were sent off to a&e right away. My little boy went into shock so the first aider was reluctant to leave us, luckily my carer is our first aider so she looked after my son during the drive to hospital with my husband.

I am absolutely disgusted at the school, I hope that they will at least review the procedure for what to do in that situation. I wonder if your son was in shock as that would explain his reaction. My son is autistic and went non verbal when he went into shock. Usually we don't know that our boy is in pain (he has quite a high threshold of pain, we don't know he is poorly until he has a 40 C and collapsed.) But the scream when he fell told me immediately that it was broken, his sobbing gave us concern immediately.

[Triliteral]

To those criticising the OP, and particularly to the poster who said it was neglect, I feel your comments are unreasonable and unpleasant. The OP was clearly concerned about her son's welfare, but was uncertain how to proceed. Two people, one the child's father, the other who is supposedly trained to deal with such situations both told her that she would be fussing unecessarily if she took him to A&E. We are being bombarded continuously in the media about people visiting A&E and waiting time. I think many people, given those things against them might have doubted themselves and done nothing.

Instead of that, and suspecting other people might have a different opinion, she sought advice from a source that she probably felt was reasonably reliable, and from whom she could get advice where she was sure she wasn't troubling anyone unecessarily. For anyone who feels an internet forum like this is not a reliable source of information, I would say that from observation, there are often medics on here who offer help and additionally other people who have experienced something similar. If you only look at this thread, not only did the majority of commenters correctly advise that it was best to err on the side of caution, more than one person offered specific advice regarding the type of fracture that was present.

The situation was not life threatening. She provided her child with pain-relief and followed the advice of the professional person who had seen her son at the school. When his failure to recover alerted her to the fact that the injury was potentially more serious than had previously been assumed, she took appropriate advice from a mixed group of parents and medical professionals on the internet and took her son to a place where diagnosis and treatment has been provided without excessive delay. It is very common for fractures only to be diagnosed after a delay, when failure to improve indicates a different diagnosis from that originally suspected. That's actually how medicine works in general. Nothing whatsoever neglectful has occurred.

Hope your son makes a swift recovery OP.

[FreshPrincessOfBelAir]

Well said Trilateral.

[SnuffleGruntSnorter]

Absolutely Trilateral. Happy to confirm that OP got a doctors opinion very quickly by asking on here. She clearly wasn't happy with what the first aided had said so sought more opinions as she was unsure about the most appropriate action to take, I don't see anything wrong with that.