Should a wrist look like this once a cast is removed?

[BlueberryMarshmallow]

My gran has recently broken her arm (64 so a young granny!). The break was pretty bad in 3 places. She had it pulled and put into a cast and it has been 5 weeks.

2 weeks ago she went for a check up and was told the cast could be removed, she was discharged and given a sheet of exercises to do. Her wrist looked pretty bad but we put it down to swelling.

It has been 2 weeks now and the lump she thought was swelling actually feels like bone. Should it look like this or do you think something is wrong? She is still in a lot of pain and cannot bend it back at all.

Any advice greatly received!

I'm a physio that has worked in a fracture clinic. Badly fractured wrists will sometimes not always get their preinjury appearance back.

However if it is still painful, it is worth her asking for a further review. Has she been totally discharged now?

Yeah she has been completely discharged. She is taking over the counter pain tablets which manage the pain normally but when she tries the exercises she really struggles. She has no movement at all backwards and can move it forward a bit but not back or side to side.

Is this normal or should she try to get an appointment to be looked at?

It wouldn't be abnormal for there to be that little movement initially on removing the cast but a couple of weeks on there should be more.

How often is she doing the exercises?