What Is A Musculoskeletal Injury?

Musculoskeletal injuries are also known as Musculoskeletal disorders. Which are soft tissue injuries caused by sudden impact, force, vibration, and unbalanced positions.  They can influence the muscles; nerves; ligaments; joints, blood vessels, neck, and lower back.

Causes of Musculoskeletal Injury/Disorder

• Postural strain
• Repetitive movements
• Prolonged used of computer
• Poor posture
• Trauma
• Working too long without breaks
• Vibrations
• Exerting too much force
• Uncomfortable working position

Symptoms of Musculoskeletal Injuries

A person having a musculoskeletal injury may sometimes feel acute pain on their entire bodies and muscles may twitch or burn. Swelling, numbness, and tingling may be part of the MSD symptoms.

The REAL First Aid approach to musculoskeletal injuries

The approach has three distinct phases that are taught and applied in a simple model.

1.       Assessment

2.       Pain Management

3.       Treatment

1.  Assessment

Whilst we may not be able to diagnose a sprained wrist from a fracture we can – and should – assess the injury.   Doing so:

a) will provide a benchmark for reassessment of both pain and damage to determine improvement or deterioration over time

b) might reveal damage to important underlying structures.

CSM Assessment

A physical examination may reveal more sinister damage to blood vessels or nerves.

2.  Pain Management

Pain in itself is not life threatening but pain can cause physiological changes in blood pressure, breathing and pulse.  This is interesting but the main reason to manage a casualty’s pain, is to make your life and theirs more bearable.

A pain-free casualty will be

• more compliant
• more willing to engage in their own treatment
• less dependent on others
• easier to move and transport
• more willing to accept potentially painful procedures such as examination or wound cleaning, for example.
• Better rested with less disturbed sleep, less stressed and generally a nicer person to be around.   This is especially important in remote areas when living in small groups or teams and in confined areas!

3.  Treatment

After pain has been managed, our treatment is limited to reducing movement.  Movement aggravates pain and inhibits healing.  How involved our treatment is will depend on several factors.

• Are they able to support the injury themselves?
• How much pain is the casualty in?
• Do we have to move the casualty?
• How long will we be with the casualty?

For example, a casualty who has fallen onto an outstretched hand, with only a mild amount of pain, close to definitive care, who has full range of movement and CSM, who is not going to be moved may not require any additional support other than ‘nursing’ their arm whilst cold therapy or pain relief is administered.

A casualty with an obvious fracture dislocation, whose ankle is clearly displaced, in considerable pain and is far from help will clearly require immobilization.

This requires the care giver to make an informed decision.  Immobilization is time consuming, always more difficult in reality than in the classroom and is likely to cause pain whilst being applied to the casualty.  As such a more pragmatic approach is promoted of “doing as little as is needed, not as much as can be done”.

Causes of Musculoskeletal Injury/Disorder

• Postural strain
• Repetitive movements
• Prolonged used of computer
• Poor posture
• Trauma
• Working too long without breaks
• Vibrations
• Exerting too much force
• Uncomfortable working position