[hopeful27]

Broken fingers?

by hopeful27 on Wed May 06, 2015 10:36 am

Does myeloma affect toes and fingers? Would a broken finger be due to inactive myeloma?

[blair77]

Re: Broken fingers?

by blair77 on Thu May 07, 2015 1:45 am

Doubtful!

[Ladyaero]

Re: Broken fingers?

by Ladyaero on Thu May 07, 2015 4:32 pm

Have you had any scans of that area? If you had a pre-existing lesion on a bone, that could make a break more likely even when the myeloma is inactive.

This happened with my husband. He had broken one clavicle prior to being diagnosed, due to lesions, but the other one held on until after the myeloma was under control. Pushing himself up in bed one day, we heard a crack and turns out he had broken the second clavicle (this was after 1.5 years of getting bone strengtheners, too).

[NStewart]

Re: Broken fingers?

by NStewart on Fri May 08, 2015 1:23 pm

Anything with myeloma is possible. Unfortunately, the only areas that are normally scanned for bone lesions due to myeloma are the areas of high bone marrow content. Two years ago, I developed severe bone pain in my lower leg during exercises that I was doing in PT to rehab my knee after knee replacement surgery. The pain was such that I had to stop doing many of the exercises. When I reported this to my oncologist, he ordered a skeletal survey and scans of my fibula and tibia. This revealed lesions on both of my tibia. I had radiation for the symptomatic lesion on one tibia.

All this is to say that lesions are possible anywhere in our bones, but we wouldn't know about areas of low bone marrow unless every bone in our bodies were scanned. This is rarely done. I would suggest asking for, at the minimum, xrays of your lower arms and hands to see if their are any lesions there. If the finger fracture is a result of a bone lesion, it might show up. When I had a pathologic fracture of my left humerus, it showed up that there was a lesion at the fracture site. Up to that point I had not had any documented lesions.

I hope that you heal well,
Nancy in Phila