If you play sports or are active you know that spraining an ankle is common injury. It occurs when the ligaments in your ankle joint are stretched or torn. You may be told to rest to allow it to heal, but for some, that injury can keep happening, meaning extra measures must be done to prevent further injury.
From basketball, to baseball, track, and cross country, 17-year-old Winston Clark is involved in sports year round.
But that changed when he injured his ankle during a pickup basketball games just over a year and a half ago.
“I was like ‘mom, you’ve got to come check this out,’ and there was this big lump on the side of my ankle,” said Clark, a high school junior.
“Initially when I saw him there was some concern of an ankle fracture on X-ray. We went over it with him and didn’t think it was a fracture, more of a pretty severe ankle sprain. Ankle sprains are graded on a system, and the more ligaments you injure on the lateral side of the ankle, the worse it gets,” said podiatrist, Chad Stapp, DPM, Avera Orthopedics – Aberdeen.
After rest and rehab for about eight weeks, Winston returned to sports, this time track and field.
“I just got done running the 4X8 and I had to go high jump and they were stressing me to get there, me and another kid that had ran the 4X8, so I jumped before him and my ankle just rolled over and that was that,” said Clark.
“MRI was ordered at that time, and showed instability and tear of all three of his ligaments on the outside of his ankle as well as concern of injury to his syndesmosis,” said Stapp.
Surgical Repair for This Sprain
That injury would need to be repaired surgically.
“There’s two parts to that repair, the internal bracing part of the repair that involves repairing what’s called the anterior fibular ligament, which is the ligament in your ankle that helps resist the inversion or rolling of your ankle. In a normal ankle sprain that’s the main ligament that resists that. And also repair of the syndesmosis, it’s a suture tightrope across the ankle joint to help support that,” said Stapp.
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Treating Chronic Sprains
Just over a year ago, sophomore McKenzie Jorgensen found herself in a similar situation. She injured her ankle at a soccer tournament.
“I rolled my ankle and it hurt a bit and got really swollen but it went away and then came back during track,” said Jorgensen, a sophomore.
“McKenzie had a history of chronic sprains or multiple sprains and she came to me after about her third or fourth in one year's time. That’s not uncommon, many people have one or two ankle sprains and after one or two ankle sprains they get this repetitive loosening of the joint and they’re susceptible to sprains over and over,” said podiatrist and foot and ankle surgeon, Garret Wobst, DPM, Avera Orthopedics – Aberdeen.
McKenzie wanted to get back to playing sports quickly, so she opted for surgical repair of her ankle.
“Surgery is essentially taking a look at the ankle joint through a scope, cleaning the ankle joint out, removing any scar tissue that has formed because of the instability. Then we do a small incision on the outside part of the ankle and construct one or two ligaments depending on what the MRI says is torn,” said Wobst. “In her case, two ligaments were torn so we re-tensioned those ligaments, and we used a special technique called a checkrein, to get her back onto the field quickly and she recovered very well.”
One-Third Ankle Sprains Heal With Problems
Both doctors say ankle sprains are not uncommon. And if you continue to injure your ankle, surgery is often an option to get you back to being active.
“There’s about 25,000 ankle sprains that occur in the United States per day, and people don’t realize that about one in three, or 33%, will heal with problems, and the most common problem is that the ligament doesn’t heal with enough tension, or it’s loose,” said Wobst.
“If it continues to have discomfort and pain through physical therapy, through bracing or taping. If those things do not help then it’s best to get it surgically fixed to decrease the chance of reoccurrence,” said Stapp.
So whether it’s the soccer field or the basketball court, these high school athletes are ready to get back to the sports they love.
“I could definitely tell it was different but after awhile it was fine,” said Clark.
“I scored two goals with my ankle,” said Jorgensen.
Winston recently broke his wrist playing basketball, but hopes to return to basketball soon.
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