Monteggia fracture

Synonyms in the broadest sense

forearm fracture, luxation fracture, forearm fracture

Terminological origin

The Monteggia fracture was named after the surgeon Giovanni B. Monteggia from Milan. He was the first to describe this special form of forearm fracture.

Symptoms

The disease often begins with the so-called falling asleep and “formication” (= tingling) on the tip of the middle finger. Due to a one-sided position of the wrist when talking on the phone, riding a bike, … the complaints are triggered. A short time later the patient has the feeling of a swollen hand.

Pain is felt in the whole hand, sometimes also in the forearm. The above-mentioned pains occur preferably at rest, and therefore particularly frequently at night. During the course of the disease, the pain and discomfort is not limited to the night-time pain and discomfort.

Increasingly, the symptoms also occur during the day. Patients often report “clumsiness” and sudden “weakness” of the hand. The sensitivity of the skin on the thumb, index, middle and ring fingers is increasingly reduced. In later stages, the thumb ball musculature can be lost. Fortunately, the complete loss of skin sensitivity in the hand occurs very rarely today.

Risk factors

In order to be able to make a detailed diagnosis, it is important that the patient explains all his or her complaints to the doctor. Questions about accompanying diseases, such as diabetes mellitus (“diabetes”), malfunctions of the thyroid gland or fractures in the area of the wrists are also important.

Alternative diseases

If there is a compression of the median nerve in the hand area, this can be determined by measuring the “nerve currents” (= ENGElectromyography by a neurologist (= neurologist, specialist in neurology). Note: It is quite possible that pressure damage to a nerve in the hand, shoulder and neck area may occur simultaneously

X-ray imagesMRI

Although carpal tunnel syndrome cannot be diagnosed by means of an X-ray examination, this examination is still useful. Often other diseases associated with carpal tunnel syndrome are found (e.g. arthrosis of the thumb saddle joint). In most cases, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is not useful. Only in the case of a concrete suspicion of a tumor is such a complex examination useful.