Silver Star injuries: what we see, what to do, and when to come in

Silver Star is on our doorstep, and Sovereign Lake is right next door. We see the consequences in clinic from December through to a surprisingly late spring season, and most of the injuries fall into a small handful of patterns.

Here’s a practical guide to the most common ones, what to watch for, and when to come in versus when to head straight to emergency.

The big four we see

1. Knees: skiers more than snowboarders

The classic ski knee injury is the medial collateral ligament (MCL) sprain, the inside-of-the-knee ligament getting overloaded when a ski catches an edge and the lower leg twists outward. Less common but more serious: anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears, often from a fall where the binding doesn’t release in time, or from the dreaded “phantom foot” position landing backseat after a jump.

When to come in: persistent knee pain, swelling, or instability after a fall, especially if you heard or felt a “pop.” Mild MCL sprains often respond well to a few weeks of focused care including exercise rehab and Active Release Technique® for the surrounding tissue.

When to head to ER: locked knee that won’t straighten, severe deformity, or you can’t bear any weight at all.

2. Wrists and shoulders: snowboarders more than skiers

Snowboarders fall on their hands. A lot. The classic injury is a wrist sprain or a broken wrist from landing hand-first. The small scaphoid bone in the wrist is especially easy to break and easy to miss without imaging. Shoulder dislocations also happen, often a separation between the collarbone and the shoulder blade from the impact, or a full shoulder dislocation when the arm gets levered out.

When to come in: persistent wrist or shoulder pain with limited range of motion that doesn’t settle in a few days.

When to head to ER: obvious deformity, significant swelling within minutes, numbness or coldness in the fingers, or any fracture concern.

3. Heads and necks: both disciplines

Concussions don’t always happen on the dramatic falls. Sometimes a moderate head impact that “felt fine” at the time produces symptoms hours or days later. Whiplash-style neck injuries are also common, especially from chairlift collisions and lower-speed falls where the head whips back.

Watch for these symptoms in the 24–72 hours after a head impact:

• Headache that worsens
• Difficulty concentrating, memory issues
• Light or sound sensitivity
• Nausea, balance problems
• Sleep changes
• Mood changes (irritability, low mood)

If any of these show up, get assessed. We screen for concussion at the first visit and coordinate with appropriate concussion-specialist care if your presentation warrants it. We also work with the neck and upper-back component of post-concussive symptoms as part of recovery.

When to head to ER immediately: loss of consciousness, repeated vomiting, severe headache, weakness or numbness in the limbs, slurred speech, or significant confusion.

4. Skier’s thumb

Specific to skiers: a fall onto the hand while still gripping a pole can sprain or tear the ulnar collateral ligament of the thumb. The thumb feels weak when pinching, and the inside of the joint is tender.

When to come in: persistent thumb weakness or pain a few days after the fall. Early diagnosis matters here, because complete tears sometimes need surgical repair.

The injury you might not notice for a week

A pattern we see often: someone takes a “nothing fall” (maybe a slow-speed catch, maybe a tumble in the trees), gets up, finishes the day. By Tuesday, the neck or low-back is locked up. By Friday, the headache has shown up.

That delayed presentation is normal. Soft-tissue inflammation peaks 24–72 hours after the injury, and stiffness often lags behind that. If you fell, even a “non-event” fall, and your body is talking to you a few days later, that’s worth coming in for. Earlier care typically means a shorter recovery.

What we do for ski and snowboard injuries

Most of the work involves a combination of:

• Assessment: figuring out which tissue is actually driving the symptoms (often not the obvious one)
• Hands-on treatment: joint mobilization, chiropractic adjustments where appropriate, Active Release Technique® and Graston Technique® for soft-tissue restrictions
• Rehab: graded loading to rebuild capacity in the injured area, plus the surrounding tissue that’s been guarding
• Coordination: if imaging is needed, or if we suspect a structure that needs surgical evaluation, we refer

For uncomplicated soft-tissue injuries, most patients are back to full activity inside a few weeks. More structural injuries (confirmed ligament tears, fractures, severe whiplash) take longer and often involve a coordinated team.

A note on coming back too soon

The biggest predictor of a chronic problem from a winter sports injury is going back to riding before the tissue has actually healed. The early-season injury that turns into a season-long problem is almost always one where the patient pushed back too fast, re-injured, and never quite caught up.

Our job is to get you back to skiing or riding as quickly as the tissue will reasonably allow, and to be honest with you when “as quickly as you’d like” and “as quickly as the tissue will allow” are different timelines.

Booking

If you’re nursing something from a recent day at Silver Star, book online or give us a call. The earlier we see it, the simpler the recovery usually is.