Drawing Blood

These fingers have been colours you wouldn't believe...

There are injuries in archery that earn respect. Torn shoulders. Sore backs. String slap that resembles a domestic dispute with a nettle. Today's injury, however, is more on the bizarre side. It announces itself by turning a perfectly respectable finger into something resembling an overripe aubergine, usually halfway through an otherwise enjoyable shoot. Sound familiar? Need more details?

So, as an archer, you've probably already developed a wary relationship with bodily idiosyncrasies. But what are your thoughts when a part of your body (a finger) suddenly changes colour and swells, often with no obvious injury. It looks alarming, feels odd, is annoying to shoot with .. so what the heck is it? Well, the symptoms you want to look for are...

• sudden onset triggered by a fairly minor physical action
• painful at first as a blood vessel bursts
• rapid pressure/swelling sensation
• blue/purple discoloration
• largely resolved within a day or two

This is a curious ailment called Achenbach syndrome.  A medical condition with a name that sounds less like a vascular disorder and more like a goalkeeper for a mid-table Bundesliga side. It most commonly affects middle-aged women, although plenty of archers have experienced episodes that sound remarkably similar. Whether we're genuinely more susceptible or simply very good at finding obscure ways to annoy our fingers remains open to debate.

It's easy to see why archery might occasionally provoke an episode. Repetitive finger flexion, pressure on the digital arteries, cold outdoor ranges, and that death grip on the tab when you're having one of those days all seem like plausible ingredients.

Good news. Achenbach syndrome, is generally considered benign. The reassuring prognosis is .. The episodes are self-limiting. They don't usually lead to permanent damage. Most people just get occasional recurrences.

The bad news is that your draw hand appears to have developed a dramatic flair for turning a minor capillary leak into a full theatrical production. Unfortunately, drawing the string is EXACTLY the sort of activity that will cause this "trauma inducing, crippling injury" to your draw fingers just as that personal best was about to be crushed. (Honest Mister!) The frustrating bit is that the prevention strategy is approximately equivalent to: "Try not to be a human with fingers." The literature we found about prevention is pretty disappointing. There isn't a magic vitamin or exercise known to stop it. Most advice boils down to:

• avoid obvious triggering pressure when possible ... such as drawing a bowstring
• keep hands warm ... except when they're wrapped around a bowstring.
• manage any underlying vascular issues ... while quietly pretending the bowstring had nothing to do with it.

Which is medical shorthand for: "we know what it is, but we're not entirely sure why it keeps doing that."

Professional level of medical supplies at GA

If you do suffer from this, the odds are on your side to be able to continue shooting. You have 10 digits. Only 2 are REALLY important to your draw - Index and middle finger on the draw hand. The ring finger is certainly invited to the party, but the index and middle fingers are doing most of the heavy lifting. Your other fingers, like rear view mirrors belonging to French drivers, don't matter. That means an attack by Achenbach only has a 20% chance of really messing up shootie, a 10% chance of being a bit of a niggle BUT a 100% chance of becoming a story you’ll tell at least four times before the kettle boils. An injury worthy of extensive retelling around the sausage tent indeed.

Just in case Achenbach sounds familiar, its probably because you are getting it mixed up with Reichenbach which was the waterfall where Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty supposedly fell to their deaths. To clear up any confusion, one involves Victorian detective fiction. The other involves a capillary having an emotional episode though we are willing to admit that "The Adventure of the Purple Finger" sounds exactly like a Holmes story.

• Watson: "Good heavens, Holmes! Your finger has turned blue!"
• Holmes: "Elementary, my dear Watson. The clue lies not in the finger, but in the excessively tight lid of the marmalade jar."

So, Achenbach syndrome: An injury that arrives uninvited, makes an enormous fuss, ruins one end, and then disappears before the field captain can find the accident book.

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Article on Archers Elbow ... an infamous archery injury.