Writing this from a hotel with my leg on a pillow. Went over on a kerb, fibula fracture, local hospital put a full plaster on yesterday afternoon. No surgery, they said it will heal in the cast.
Flight home is tomorrow evening, about four hours. Hospital discharged me with a leaflet in a language I do not read and nobody mentioned flying at all. Is there anything I am supposed to do about the cast before I get on a plane, or do I just turn up with a crutch and hope?
Do not just turn up. Ring the airline this morning.
Two separate things you need from them: whether they want anything from a doctor, and a seat you can actually sit in with a straight leg. On some aircraft a leg in a full plaster does not fit in a standard seat at all and they will move you or refuse to board you. Better to find that out today than at the gate with a crutch.
Keith, the specific thing to ask about is whether the cast needs splitting, and please ask a clinician today rather than tomorrow.
The short version: on flights of more than two hours taken within about 24 to 48 hours of a cast being applied, the cast may need splitting along its length, sometimes called bivalving. The reason is physical rather than vague. Cabins are pressurised to a cabin altitude of roughly 6,000 to 8,000 feet, trapped gas expands by roughly a quarter at that pressure, and a fresh fracture is still swelling in its own right. A closed rigid plaster has nowhere to give, so the combination can leave it pressing hard enough to restrict circulation. Splitting it lets the swelling expand while the bone stays supported.
Your flight is four hours and your cast will be roughly 48 hours old, so you are right on the edge of that window, which is exactly why it needs a person rather than a rule. Go back to the hospital that applied it, or find a clinic today, and ask them to decide and to write down what they decide. Please do not cut it yourself; a badly split cast stops supporting the fracture. The background is written up in flying after a fracture or with a plaster cast, but your particular cast is a job for the people who put it on.
One other thing to raise with them, since you cannot see the skin: an immobilised leg is a recognised risk factor for clots, and a four hour flight adds to that. What precautions are appropriate for you is their call, not mine and not the forum's.
That is genuinely useful and slightly alarming, thank you. Going back to the hospital this afternoon. I would not have thought to ask.
Also book assistance with the airline while you are at it. At least 48 hours ahead normally, but ring anyway and explain, they can often do it shorter notice for a genuine injury abroad. Free at most airports and it is the difference between arriving at the gate wrung out and arriving at the gate.
Watch your toes on the flight too. Colour, warmth, feeling. It is the only bit of you that you can actually see.
Back from the hospital. They split the cast, wrapped it, and gave me a letter in English and their own language saying what was done and that I am fit to travel with it. Airline has moved me to a bulkhead seat and booked a wheelchair at both ends.
Slightly astonished that none of that would have happened if I had not posted here.
This is the thread I will be sending people. Nobody tells you the cast is the problem. Everybody assumes the broken bone is the problem.
Keith, ring your insurer when you land as well if you have not already. A fracture abroad is a change in your health and they like to hear it from you rather than from a claim form.
This thread has been quiet for sixty days, so it is now closed to new replies. Whether you personally are fit to fly, and when, is a question for the surgeon who operated on you and knows your recovery, not something a forum can settle. Please start a new thread if you want current input.
