Bones are strong enough to support your growing body, but too much pressure can cause one to break. A broken bone can happen from something like a bad fall from your bike, or from a bad collision on the soccer field. Illnesses, like arthritis, and traumas, like fractures, can greatly affect the bone’s health, strength and growth.
Healing a broken bone is very similar to growing bone in the first place!
When a bone is broken, so are the tiny blood vessels inside. These bleed, making a clot around the break. Special cells in the clot clean the break and form cartilage (the same as the bendable stuff in your nose and ears). The cartilage serves as a frame for new bone cells to settle. These new cells create solid bone through the natural process of bone renovation. One kind of cell moves into the break to eat up the cartilage, while another kind of cell forms new bone. The new bone can be just as strong as the old bone was before it broke.
Bone is constantly being broken down and re built by the process of bone remodeling, so that it is as strong as possible. Bone remodeling makes the bone a good candidate for healing itself from small traumas!This makes the bone a tissue that can heal itself fairly well, since it is prepared to re model itself all the time. But even with minor injuries the bones need help to heal properly!
Bones are strong enough to support your growing body, but too much pressure in one area can cause a bone to break. A broken bone can be caused by a hard fall off your bike or a bad collision on the soccer field. Although a bone fracture is very painful, the body is prepared to fix the break!
How can my body fix a break?
When a bone is broken, so are the blood vessels inside. These bleed, making a clot around the break. Special cells in the clot clean the break to prevent infection. Young cells from the bone marrow form cartilage, the same material that makes up bendable parts of the body such as the nose and ears. Another kind of cell then moves into the break to eat up the cartilage, while still another kind of cell forms new bone.
Healing a broken bone is very similar to growing bone in the first place! The body is prepared to continually renew the bone with the process of bone renovation. It produces an entire crew of cells to repair old bone tissue that can also fix broken bone tissue.
This makes bone tissue unique because the new bone is just as strong as the bone was before it broke! Other tissues in the body, such as skin and heart muscle, can't heal as well and form scars in the places where they were mended.
Remember!
Although bones are sturdy enough to support most activities, they can break.
MM_preloadImages('/sepa/regmed/images/GR_RegenerativeMedicineOn.gif','/sepa/regmed/images/GR_Movies_ON.gif','/sepa/regmed/images/GR_Home_ON.gif','/sepa/regmed/images/GREducationON.gif','/sepa/regmed/images/GR_GamesON.gif'); initializeReadingLevel();
" width="1" height="1" />
