<\/p>
A broken toe is usually painful, swollen, red or bruised, and difficult to walk on. If the break is severe, the toe may stick out at an angle, or the bone may poke through the skin.<\/p>\n
In reality, it\u2019s quite difficult to know if a toe is broken, bruised or sprained without an X-ray<\/a>. However, if the toe is in normal alignment (not bent out of normal position), and it\u2019s not your big toe that\u2019s affected, then an X-ray won\u2019t usually be done. In reality, the treatment isn\u2019t that different.<\/p>\n Whether the toe is bruised or broken, the key things you can do at home are: take regular painkillers to ease the pain and swelling; rest the foot and keep it elevated; avoid walking as much as possible; hold an ice pack or bag of frozen peas wrapped in a towel to the toe for up to 10 minutes every couple of hours; wear comfortable shoes; and strap the broken toe.<\/p>\n This means putting a small piece of cotton wool between your injured toe and the toe next to it, then taping them together to support the injured toe. If it\u2019s your big toe that you suspect is broken, it\u2019s worth going to Accident & Emergency (A&E) as this may require an X-ray.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n To submit your questions email us at questions@sciencefocus.com (don\u2019t forget to include your name and location)<\/em><\/p><\/body><\/html>\n By Dr Nish Manek Published: Sunday, 24 April 2022 at 12:00 am A broken toe is usually painful, swollen, red or bruised, and difficult to walk on. If the break is severe, the toe may stick out at an angle, or the bone may poke through the skin. In reality, it\u2019s quite difficult to know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":12051,"template":"","categories":[30],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"2"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised.jpg",1200,511,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised-300x128.jpg",300,128,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised-768x327.jpg",768,327,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised-1024x436.jpg",800,341,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised.jpg",1200,511,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/04\/how-do-i-know-if-my-toe-is-broken-or-just-bruised.jpg",1200,511,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Dr Nish Manek Published: Sunday, 24 April 2022 at 12:00 am A broken toe is usually painful, swollen, red or bruised, and difficult to walk on. If the break is severe, the toe may stick out at an angle, or the bone may poke through the skin. In reality, it\u2019s quite difficult to know…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/12050"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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