Brusied ribs= suck it up



Broken ribs= go see a doc, could be/get worse

I pulled a chest muscle and heard a nice cracking noise from my chest while moving a pallet by hand back in Oct.  After standing up I couldn't talk or even breathe for a minute or two.  It fucking hurt bad.  

Went to the Dr. a few days later and when mentioning I was concerned that I possibly cracked my ribs he told me "There is nothing we can do for your ribs really, if you want we could take an x ray which would just unnecessarily expose you to radiation and the treatment wouldn't be any different anyways, just rest and recover".  So he gave me a script for the prescription form of Aleve (literally, its the exact same thing), offered me a narcotic pain killer (work with machinery so can't take that without missing work would mean missed pay ) and just told me to take it easy.  It was around a month or so before I could lift anything over 30 lbs comfortably.  Even after that I still had to be careful for another month before I was back to what things were like before the injury.

Ace bandage wrap around your ribs might help some.  I remember that happened to me when I was younger and it took about 6 months before the twinge of pain finally disappeared.

This    

I brusied my ribs a few years back.   Hurts like Hell

The nurse practitioner at my doctor's office gave me a scrip for some Vicodin for a bruised rib in January.  I took half tabs a few times, now I have a nice Vicodin stash.

They take months to hear normally.  Bruised mine a couple times, gun safe fell on me, and dirt bike wreck.

Seven times for me. Mt. Biking is hard on the ribs. If they don't flail when you inhale (ha) just tough it out. It does hurt like  a sonofabitch though.

Don't fucking sneeze.

I've broken several ribs. Last one was last year playing baseball with the kids, dove for a ball and heard a crack. Kept playing but couldn't make a very accurate throw after that. I knew it was broken but I didn't go to the doc for a week until I had gotten so tired because I couldn't get a good nights sleep. Got some pain meds and could finally sleep but it was sore for at least a month.

Broke 3 in a MX crash once and that hurt for a good 6 weeks and probably for 2 years whenever I sneezed.

This.



Cut back on all possible activity; take whatever pain medication you can get.



Bruised/broken ribs hurt like hell. Most MD's don't even bother with X-rays anymore, unless you go to the ER,where they charge hundreds of dollars for them.



Take it easy. I hope they are 'only' bruised, because the recovery is about half the time, or less, and the pain will ease up much more quickly, too.