A TFCC repair takes 4 to 6 months to return to heavy work and sport, with forearm rotation blocked for about 6 weeks. A TFCC debridement is much quicker, usually 4 to 6 weeks.
Most people are back to normal daily use about 6 weeks after ganglion cyst removal, with push-ups and weight through the wrist last at 2 to 3 months. The two things to know: it can come back, and the scar can leave you stiffer than the lump did.
A fused joint usually knits in 8 to 12 weeks and most people are back to full use in 3 to 6 months. You lose movement at that one joint only: a fused wrist still turns palm up and palm down, and the work afterwards is keeping every neighboring joint moving.
Most people are back to light everyday use 6 to 8 weeks after wrist plate surgery and to heavy lifting and sport at 3 to 6 months. Move early, load late, plus the thumb tendon check to do weekly for a year.
Most people are back at a desk 1 to 2 weeks after scaphoid surgery and back to heavy work or contact sport at 3 to 6 months, once a CT scan confirms the bone has healed. Here’s the week-by-week timeline, exercises and red flags.
Intersection syndrome is inflamed tendons 4 to 8 cm above the wrist on the back of the forearm, often with a squeak you can feel. Most settle in 2 to 6 weeks with a splint and a change of load.
ECU tendonitis is an overloaded tendon on the little-finger side of the back of the wrist, and most settle in 6 to 12 weeks. If the wrist snaps when you turn your palm up after an injury, a cast in the first few weeks can heal it without surgery.
Kienböck’s disease is the lunate, a small central wrist bone, losing its blood supply and collapsing, usually in a 20 to 40 year old with no injury. Early X-rays are often normal; an MRI finds it, and the stage decides whether the bone can still be saved.
SLAC and SNAC wrist are arthritis that follows an old injury: a missed scapholunate tear or a scaphoid that never healed. The wear follows a predictable route, and each stage it passes closes off one of the surgical options.
Gymnast’s wrist is a stress injury to the radius growth plate from weight-bearing on bent-back wrists. It needs a full stop on hand weight-bearing for at least 4 to 6 weeks, often 3 months if the X-ray has changed, then a staged return.