Post Traumatic thumb pain

Dear Ask The Doctor: Alright! First off, thank you for taking the time to look at my question. I don't have insurance or the funds to go see a doctor right now, so I really appreciate your help. Since I'm not sure what exactly is wrong with my thumb, I'll just explain how I injured it, and what my symptoms are. A few months ago (back around the beginning of October), a friend was teaching me how to box. Sadly, all he had for me were MMA gloves, which left my thumb completely unprotected. During our sparring, I ended up punching his elbow a few times, with the brunt of the impacts unfortunately being taken by my thumb. I didn't notice while we were fighting because of the adrenaline, but afterward, I noticed I could barely move my thumb without a ridiculous amount of pain flaring up; at first I thought I might have fractured it, but I regained most range of movement within a week or so of our sparring match. Today, I have full range of movement with zero pain, but if I press on my thumb to move it anywhere out of its range of movement, it still hurts a lot. Obviously, it also hurts much more than it should if I bump it into things, and some pain is experienced if I try to put a heavy load on it, say by lifting a heavy object or opening an especially stubborn jar. Also, my thumb sometimes now cracks, when I don't remember it cracking before (though, my other thumb cracks too, so I don't think it's a big deal), and sometimes it feels a little tingly or numb if I leave it in certain positions (I usually notice it while using a computer mouse.) At first, I wasn't worried much about it, because in the beginning, my thumb was showing very fast improvement, but it seems to have barely improved in condition of the last two months or so, so it's starting to bother me; I'm an artist and a pianist, so my hands are extremely important to me. I don't want this to become a chronic problem that ends up ruining what I enjoy ten years from now! So, thanks for taking the time to read my question. I guess I'm basically just wondering how much I should be worried about this. Do these types of joint injuries take more than a few months to heal, or? Is there any way to make it heal better? Should I be exercising my thumb somehow? Any suggestions or advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a lot.

Dear James: Most likely the symptoms that you are experiencing in your left thumb are caused by an inflammation of the thumb joint capsule: called Capsulitis. Often there is a history of recent associated trauma or repetitive use (overuse) of the affected finger. The healing time depends on each particular case, the improvement does not come overnight, sometimes takes longer, and so be patient. The conservative treatment include the following: avoid activities that reproduce the pain (so maybe you will need to modify your activities to allow enough healing time), use of anti-inflammatory medication (i.e: “Aleve”, “Advil”), and splinting of the affected finger (if needed). If there is poor or no improvement the local corticosteroid injection may be considered. In the view that you did not have at the moment of the injury any x-rays or examination, I recommend, that if the pain when you press the thumb goes toward the base close to your wrist, then get an evaluation by a Hand specialist in order to rule out the possibility of a scaphoid fracture, they are really hard to see, sometimes they go overlooked and with time are cause of chronic hand pain.