Navigating Pediatric Injuries with KidMed – Virginia This Morning (video)

Aired December 16, 2022 on Virginia This Morning

Jeff Bennett, D.O. and Mark Flanzenbaum, M.D. met with Jessica Noll of Virginia This Morning on CBS 6 (WTVR) and discussed why visiting a pediatric urgent care for treating pediatric injuries is a great choice. Watch the interview video below or read the transcript.

Watch the interview video below or read the transcript.

Video Transcript:

This segment is sponsored by KidMed Pediatric Urgent Care.

Jessica Noll:

The Doctor Is In and you have questions. With warmer weather on the way many kids will be participating in summer sports and activities. Dr. Mark Flanzenbaum and Dr. Jeff Bennett, co-founders of KidMed Pediatric Urgent Care, join us in studio to share more about KidMed and how they’re well equipped to treat sports-related injuries. It is awesome to see both of you.

Doctors Mark and Jeff:

Good to see you, Jessica.

Jessica Noll:

It is getting to be that time of year. Of course, we’ve all been a little out of pattern for so long, but we have a couple questions in terms of KidMed Pediatric Urgent Care.

Jeff, let’s talk through the benefits of taking your child with a sports injury to a pediatric urgent care. Why do that?

Dr. Bennett:

Well, you really always want as a parent what’s best for your child. So you want to go to places that have the most experience, expertise, and knowledge. And when it comes to your kids’ health, there’s really only three choices for kids, especially when it comes to ill injury and illness. You want to go to your pediatrician, a pediatric urgent care, or pediatric emergency room. And we have a wealth of great pediatricians in the area.

But, for injuries specifically, you really need an x-ray availability to fully evaluate injuries. And you also need the ability to immobilize those injuries once you know that there’s a fracture. So at KidMed, we have the availability for both those things on-site and we really are good at making the kids feel comfortable. 

We can cast them if need be, especially with this new technology called Exos casting. And it’s really amazing stuff. My old cast I had one, it was nasty underneath there. This you can take it off. You can wash the extremity, bathe, shower, put it back on. And for stable fractures, you can wear it when you play sports and the other nice thing about it is that it’s protective for the athlete, but it’s also soft on the outside and protects the other athletes, and it can get wet.

Jessica Noll:

It’s a whole new world.

Mark, let’s talk about it with pediatric injuries. They’re different, but what’s different?

Dr. Flanzenbaum:

Kids, their bones and their joints are not at all like adults. We always think of a broken bone in an adult as a snapped bone. In kids, especially young kids, they oftentimes from a very low-level fall or just tripping and falling, they can get what we call buckle fractures where the bone basically kinks a little bit, like if you take a wet twig and you just bent it a little bit. And that can typically happen in the wrist or in the lower leg.

And those are challenging cases for parents because when their kid gets injured with those sometimes they don’t have a lot of pain. Sometimes they don’t have any swelling or bruising. So we have to be aware of those that’s why we do recommend x-rays for all those injuries.

Teens represent a different challenge for us because teenagers have growing pains. If any parent out there knows, their child they’ve had growing pain, especially if they’re an athlete. We typically see it in the knee or behind the ankle in the region of the heel and it comes on with repetitive activity. So, of course, a lot of parents think my child got injured doing sports, but it’s really just an area where the growth plate hasn’t closed yet and there’s just stress on that growth plate.

For teenagers, one of the unique problems is they can come in with hip pain that are just age-related problems due to activity as well or fluid in the hip joint young kids following something as simple as a viral illness.

Probably the most common thing we see though in kids is something that’s referred to as a Nursemaid’s elbow. That’s sort of given the misnomer of a dislocation. Adults have a hinge joint for an elbow. Kids don’t. Their upper and lower arms are close to each other but then are in a joint hinge position. They have ligaments sort of like rubber bands holding them together. And if a pulling injury – if a parent is holding their child they can actually pop out the bone from underneath that rubber band. And what’s nice is that it’s a simple fix. When we see those kids, they come in uncomfortable. They leave smiling and happy.

Jessica Noll:

The moral of the story there: kids are different and this is a different type of an approach.

We have about 30 seconds left, but I do want to be clear.

Pediatric urgent care. Jeff, when is it time to go into the ER?

Dr. Bennett:

In my 30 years of experience in both doing peds and adult ER, as well as peds urgent care, there’s two specific fractures. If there’s an open fracture, meaning bone is sticking through the skin – really awful, or if there is a really very angulated fracture where the bone is bent where a bend should not be, those need to go to the emergency room. But the vast majority of fractures do not need to go to the emergency room. The cost of going to the emergency room is exorbitant. The wait times are longer. It’s a scary place for the kids as well as for some adults, too. So it’s really a good idea.

Kidmed has the ability and the knowledge and equipment to take care of little growing bones. And we have very good working relationships with the local pediatric orthopedists, and we can get them in usually the next business day if we need to.

The most important thing I have to say is please don’t panic when your kid gets injured. It’s important to go to the most appropriate place for that age group. So drive the extra mile to get the most appropriate care.

Jessica Noll:

Having a conversation like this and sharing this kind of insight does provide that peace of mind. Thank you both so much for being back with us.

Dr. Bennett and Dr. Flanzenbaum:

Thanks for having us.

Jessica Noll:

Appreciate it. We’re going to share a little information.

KidMed Pediatric Urgent Care. You’ll find an office at 8356 Bell Creek Road in Mechanicsville. For all the information you can call the team 804-559-5437. Visit the website KidMedVa.com. Connect on Facebook at Facebook.com/kidmed. And on Instagram at Instagram.com/kidmed_urgent_care. They have multiple locations right here in the community, so find the best one for you.

Please stay with us. Virginia This Morning returns right after this.