I broke my first bone when I was three years old, or so my parents have told me. I do not remember what happened but they say that I jumped off of the picnic table, and I guess I thought I could fly. Unfortunately, I was not able to fly and landed straight onto the pavement below. As a result of my naïve actions, I ended up fracturing my right clavicle, or in other words, I broke my collarbone.

Fast forward to seventh grade. My family and I were going into Brooklyn, NY to celebrate the Jewish holiday with the rest of the family, but we made a stop first. I love to ride rollercoasters, so my parents figured we would go ride one of the oldest coasters still running, the Cyclone at Coney Island. I was so excited to ride this historic rollercoaster, and my adrenaline was rushing. The ride started and right after the first turn, I heard a pop in my shoulder and have never felt so much pain before. Little did I know, I experienced the same amount of pain when I was three. After going to the hospital, they told me that I had fractured my right clavicle…again.

A drawing of what a fractured clavicle looks like.

I have only broken two bones in my life, and they both happened to be the same one. The doctor said that this was a freak accident and that something like this rarely happens, especially to such an abnormal bone. If it was a finger or wrist, that would be  a little different. This got me thinking about the chances of breaking the same bone twice.

Null Hypothesis: Broken bones do not get stronger than they were before they were broken.

Alternative Hypothesis: Broken bones become stronger than they were before they were broken.

Studies for this hypothesis are simply observational and anecdotal, because it could be considered unethical to have people break their bones for this type of research. In my opinion, I believe the null hypothesis to be true simply because of my history with broken bones.

The three areas of the collarbone and the frequency of fractures by location.

To state the obvious, human bones and muscles strengthen when they are used a lot, but they also weaken when they are not being used as much. “Wolff’s Law was developed by the German anatomist and surgeon Julius Wolff in the 19th century that states that bone in a healthy person or animal will adapt to the loads under which it is placed. If loading on a particular bone increases, the bone will remodel itself over time to become stronger to resist that sort of loading.The inverse is true as well: if the loading on a bone decreases, the bone will become weaker due to turnover”.

After a bone is broken, the healing process is started when a callus is formed over the fracture to protect it from further damage. In addition to being added protection, “calcium is deposited to aid rebuilding”, according to Dr. Terry D. Amaral, director of pediatric orthopedic surgery at Montefiore Medical Center. In return, the fracture site becomes stronger than the rest of the bone due to all of the extra calcium that it has been receiving.

At some point, the bones will return to equal strength, and the fracture site will be no more or less likely to break again. It returns to a clean slate, and whatever happens depends on the actions of the person. “Dr. Amaral said that in studies in which healed bones were subjected to bending and twisting forces, the repaired bones were capable of breaking anywhere, including the fracture site” according to the NY Times.

In conclusion, the null hypothesis is correct, just not for the reasons that I thought. The bones in fact do get stronger when they are making a full recovery, but once it is healed, the chances of breaking it again are the same before it was broken. Like my doctor said, breaking my collarbone twice in the same area was truly a freak accident.