How to Protect Your Wrists & Hands from Harm

Writers and editors spend much of their days at the keyboard, so they’re prone to carpal tunnel syndrome. A devastating medical condition, carpal tunnel syndrome keeps you from typing — and therefore from working — for quite a while. While not everyone develops the condition, you may have some unhealthy habits that can lead to hand and wrist problems.

The carpal tunnel is the rigid, narrow passageway on the back of each hand, through which tendons and nerves pass to your fingers. It’s a pretty sturdy tunnel, but continuous pressure can eventually cause it to cave. Its lining can become inflamed and swollen too, also leading to pain and disability. Carpal tunnel syndrome occurs when the median nerve running through the tunnel gets squeezed at your wrist.

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Symptoms

When your carpal tunnel becomes damaged or inflamed, the pain alone can send you far from your keyboard. And the treatment makes it difficult to continue with your work as well. Common painful symptoms include:

• Numbness in that hand
• Weakness in your wrist, fingers or hand
• Pain in your hand or wrist
• Pain that travels up through your forearm
• Tingling or burning in the palm of your hand
• Thumb muscles become atrophied

The symptoms often begin at night and may wake you up. Or when you do arise in the morning, it feels like you have to shake your hand to get feeling back into it; it feels like your hand fell asleep and didn’t hear the alarm. When symptoms start affecting you during the day, that’s a sign the condition is getting worse. Eventually, you may not be able to feel hot or cold in that hand.

Don’t Write It Off

While repetitive stress and improper ergonomics often are the main culprits, there are other causes, such as:

• An underdeveloped tunnel
• Fluid retention
• An injury to the tunnel, such as a sprain or fracture of your hand
• Rheumatoid arthritis
• Pituitary gland problem
• Tumor or cyst pressing on the carpal tunnel
• Diabetes

With so many factors at play, it’s best to get it checked out by a physician who may take an x-ray or MRI, do blood tests, and provide hands-on manipulation to identify the underlying cause and give you a definitive diagnosis. Self-diagnosing isn’t a good idea, especially when it comes to your hands that are your source of income!

Prevention Is the Best Line of Defense

It may seem that writers and editors don’t do much in the way of physical exertion. And very often, writers place so much emphasis on the mental challenges of the job that just the thought of it being physically challenging seems ludicrous. However, writing on a keyboard or by hand is very taxing work.

And if you do it improperly, you’re going to feel the results — in your hands, your back, your shoulders, your neck and beyond. Your body is so interconnected that, like a string of dominoes, when one part goes down, the rest follow closely behind.

Take It Seriously

Taking into consideration the risks of continuing your unhealthy work habits should encourage you to take care of your money-makers. Make some simple changes now. Examine how you work, where you do your writing and what kind of equipment you rely on. You just may save yourself from some heavy-duty carpal tunnel syndrome treatment.

Simple modifications make your work feel better and stack the odds against you having hand problems. Tips for changes include:

• Correct your posture to allow the blood to flow smoothly to your extremities.
• Adjust the arms on your chair so that your arms rest gently on them while you type. Don’t press down on your arm or wrists — that could shut off blood flow and compromise your carpal tunnel.
• Lose the wrist rests. A common typing tool when ergonomics first hit the office scene, it’s now known that your wrists should never rest on anything for more than a few seconds.
• Get up and move around at least for five to 10 minutes every hour. Movement helps to shift waste products out that can clog up your veins and restrict circulation.
• Do wrist exercises before, during and after a writing session. Straighten out your arm and hold it steady with the opposite hand. Move your wrist in one direction for a minute, then reverse. Make sure you do both wrists, even if only one is hurting.
• Stretch during another of your breaks. Reach for the ceiling and pull your arms gently up to give your muscles and blood vessels a slight tug.
• Boost your circulatory system by adding foods high in B6 to your diet. Avocados, eggs, whole wheat, bananas and peanuts are just some of the foods rich in B vitamins, and B vitamins are good for your blood.

If you’re already feeling some early symptoms and your doctor approves, try wearing a splint at night while you sleep. If the pain continues to worsen, you may need to wear it during the day too. You may have to learn how to type while wearing it.

A custom-made splint may help. If all else fails, you may need to have surgery. At that point, we hope you have a good transcriber or a voice recognition program to type for you!

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