As soon as one of your bones breaks, your body springs into action to fix the injury. The time it takes for a bone to heal depends on a lot of things, such as the person’s age and location of the break.
Step 1: Blood Clot Formation and Cleanup
Within a couple of hours, a blood clot forms around the break. Inside the blood clot, special cells called phagocytes begin cleaning bone fragments.
Step 2: Soft Callus Formation
Next, another special group of cells called chondroblasts creates a soft callus made mostly of collagen around the fracture. This stage can last anywhere from 4 days to 3 weeks.
Step 3: Hard Callus Formation
A hard callus forms next as osteoblast cells create new bone, adding minerals to make it hard. This stage typically begins two weeks after the break and ends somewhere between the sixth and 12th week.
Step 4: Bone Remodeling
Lastly, the bone is remodeled. Special cells called osteoclasts break down extra bone around the fracture until it’s completely healed and returned to its original shape. Bone remodeling is a very slow process which can take anywhere from 3 to 9 years to complete!
