Improvised arm break treatment in medieval ages

[pizzazzical]

Hello! I have multiple questions on this one scenario, I hope that's all right :)

Setting: I am writing a piece set in the "dark ages" around the time of Geoffrey of Monmouth and Arthurian legends. In the fandom canon knowledge and treatment of diseases and injuries is more advanced than it actually was at the time. For example there is knowledge of

Comments

[snakewhissperer]

ok a few questions...bearing in mind that men in the middle ages and women too were a bit more used to pain than us...

If you're talking about a closed compound fracture he'd lose no blood. Open compound fracture it depends on if he'd hit arteries or the like, its up to you. If the skin is broken, then yes, he is susceptible to infection, if its not, then he's susceptible to internal bleeding more than anything, but infection was very very serious in those days. A killer. If he's concious, he would be walking back, not staying there, as put simply...there's no point in staying there. 1-2 miles is peanuts at that time, its peanuts now. I assume there is nothing wrong with his legs?

For the record, my brother had a compound fracture in junior school and the school thought he was playing it up...he walked around with it all day and did most normal school type activities, though with some trouble. He was 7-8 at the time.

[sollersuk]

I was taught that compound fractures are the same as open fractures.

[snakewhissperer]

wouldn't be the first time i was wrong, but i thought compound fractures were fractures where the two ends of the bones had shifted, and could or could not be open? IE, for instance slid next to each other but closed or at an angle and open?

wouldn't be the first time i'm wrong, mind you.

[sollersuk]

That's a complete, simple fracture with displacement. When the ends shift, the muscles usually pull them so that they overlap.That's what makes reducing them (getting the ends to meet again) difficult; the femur is the absolute worst for this because the muscles are so strong.

[sollersuk]

Geoffrey of Monmouth was writing after the Norman Conquest, describing a society much like his own, so I would say "Medieval" rather than "Dark Ages". If you really do mean "Dark Ages", what you need to get hold of is Anglo-Saxon leechdom texts

[sollersuk]

Further clarification about the riding (I have to put this in quickly as I am off on holiday today): I wondered if you were thinking of him riding bareback to round up the other horses. IRL at the time, there seems to have been no tradition of bareback riding in North West Europe; he would saddle up one horse that was in the stables to fetch the rest from wherever they were grazing. Horses appear not to have been used to it either, and would be alarmed by an attempt to mount in a really unconventional way. And assuming he has survived the bite but is still recovering, I'm not sure whether he would be able to vault onto the horse's back with an injured shoulder, though he would be able to mount using the stirrups

[autumn_belias]

also the terrain doesn't make for droving (is droving even the right word when talking of horses? I know it for other livestock but... Oo), most of Europe wasn't flat and grasslands, forests dominated and where they didn't people would have tilled the earth for fields and no sane person would drove animals through fields used for food production, that's the death of commoners and nobility alike.

and as an afterthought:
I'm also unsure he HIMSELF would go fetch the horses instead of letting a stablehand do that, unless it was some covert operation bit.

[pizzazzical]

Hello, sorry about the confusion, I was being unclear. Basically the two of them rode out for some fresh air etc. and tied their horses up after dismounting. A few hours later the man goes back to fetch the horses but since there's two of them (and he has a bad shoulder) he basically loses both of them and he goes after them. When the horse rears he is on foot, which is why he fell over and sustained the break. The confusion is all my fault though so sorry about that

[autumn_belias]

you need to differ a bit, your canon is anachronistic to start with since Arthur is roughly 5th century while Geoffrey wrote the story down in the 12th ;) one of the many sources of amusement in the show... and there are some icky medical differences, during Arthur's presumed reign they still moght have drawn tidbits from the Roman times while later... well not really.

when I was researching suturing I came upon Military Medicine in the Middle Ages and they do also say something on fractures, however I assume this is high middle ages rather than the timeframe you are looking for

[sollersuk]

In the 5th and 6th centuries Roman medicine was still functioning across the Channel, and there was a surprisingly large amount of contact. Indeed, Constantinople was still trading with Cornwall, and the Eastern Empire was still definitely going strong.

And I agree that there is a lot of wiggle room when using the series - but if the OP really is thinking in terms of Geoffrey of Monmouth, they're stuck with something very close to real life middle ages.

[pizzazzical]

Hi, thanks a lot about the information! I think I will make it a closed fracture in the end because it gives him the better chance of survival. Also in the show the character of Geoffrey of Monmouth is alive and they base a lot of details on his version of the story, however, it is still pretty unclear what exact time period it is. But anyway thanks a lot for your help, it was really useful!

[autumn_belias]

yes and the building style doesn't fit 5th century and they have glassware and stuff. I'm aware of canon in this one and that's why I said you needed to differ a little and medically speaking you might want to decide on something. on the other hand, and that someone pointed out to me when I was trying to find a timeframe for myself, there is bound to have been more than one Geoffrey born in Monmouth, the fact that we just know of one who was historically inclined means nothing at all. just a sidenote

[azalaea]

I broke my right humerus when I was 9, from a fall, in the late 80s. There was actually not much even modern medicine could do. You can’t, apparently, put a plaster cast on someone’s upper arm. At any rate, they didn’t. All that happened was I got up, my mum drove me to hospital, several hours passed before the break was confirmed, and then I wore a cloth sling for a couple of months - nothing to hold the bone in place at all. I think, from the fact that my other arm seems a bit more flexible (and I seem to remember x-rays showing the edges weren’t quite perfectly lined up), that it may have healed very slightly wonkily, but you can't tell

[pizzazzical]

Thanks so much for all this information :) It was really clear and detailed, thank you lots!!! I understand that it might set a little wonkily etc., and that he would probably lose a little flexibility in his arm. Would it, however, impair his speed, reflexes etc. enough to be detrimental in armed combat later, do you think? (I'm leaning towards yes but as shown I know little to none about these things :x)

About the fainting thing, at first I was going to have him suffer a compound fracture where he was losing blood and the pain was perhaps a lot more than a closed fracture, which is why he fainted (though even in that situation 3-4 hours seems like pushing it xD). He didn't sustain any injury apart from his arm.

Anyways thanks again for all your help that was really useful :) I'm glad you recovered well!

[azalaea]

You're very welcome!

In my case it took about 2 weeks longer to heal than it was supposed to, 8 rather than 6, I think precisely because there was no plaster or anything keeping it from jiggling about. And I was nine and was not that careful with it - almost deliberately careLESS because I resented it so much, though I still remember being devastated and hating the doctor when I thought I was only a fortnight away from being able to take the sling off and they told me it would be another month.

I don't know what difference serious wonkiness would make - if I have any it's very slight. You can't see anything. As I say I suppose if there had ever been any sign there was going to be a real problem, they would have done something about it - but my experience does show that it CAN heal fine without anything much being done. Aside from a vague and possibly untrustworthy memory of an x-ray, the only thing that makes me even suspect it's not quite right is - well, you know this yoga position? Bending my left arm up behind my back, I can do

[pizzazzical]

Wow thanks for all the information :O Also I'm glad that it probably won't really affect his swordsmanship (although even if it did he'd probably just ignore it and train 3 times as hard). So loss of range of movement, ok, he can probably live with that lol :P It needn't be a bad break (it just had to look bad, so I could use horrible imagery! But that's not the important part, I needed factual accuracy more xD)

Anyway thanks 100 times for the detail! That was so useful and helpful and gah xD Have a nice day!

[nokomarie]

In many ways, if you are going for the closed fracture, then you are going for what we actually do now, bind the arm in a nuetral position across the torso and ice it for pain. Simple as that. Six weeks is the rule of thumb, longer for complications.