Computing related injuries

[Gerk]

So .. who's got 'em?  I'm not talking about dropping a tower on your foot, I'm talking things like RSI, Carpal, Ulnar Nerve Entrapment, etc.

The latest for me is I've been diagnosed with ulnar nerve entrapment (aka tennis elbow) and currently undergoing some intensive physiotherapy for it.  My regular doctor is an asshat ... his solution, after several months of tests, xrays, ultrasounds, etc was "stop typing and using your computer."  Unfortunately that's not an option for me as it's how I make my living.  Needless to say he's now my former doctor.  Found a really good chriopractor/physio clinic that's helping sort me out.  The sad part is that now that I know the signs, symptoms and related issues and after discussions with my physio person it seems that I've had this problem for 25+ YEARS and it went un-diagnosed by several doctors.  They've told me for years that I had arthritis in my hand which is not necessarily the case (waiting on xrays to confirm or deny this problem).  At one point in my late teens I did have some ulnar problems, which apparently were never resolved.  At the time they worked on my arm long enough to make the tingling go away but not fully heal the problems.  Hopefully this is something I can recover from and it's not a permanent problem -- after 25+ years of this there's a chance that i won't fully recover.  My physio person is pretty hopeful we can get things at least mostly resolved if not fully ...

So here I sit with Kinesio tape on my arm, learning to mouse with my left hand and being overly obsessive about my workstation ergonomics ...

Anyone else go through this kind of fun or an I just the lucky one?

[audioave10]

My past injuries have always been in the industrial "heavy duty" category. Most of my typing is done during games.
I really don't seek doctors advice since they seem to tell me what I already know. They are, after all, only "practicing medicine".
I can see how it would be difficult for you when you type for a living.

[Lanx]

i had cts(carpal tunnel syndrome) and a chiro that checks my spine alignment yearly (if you have a chiro you know what this is). I haven't had any issues for a long time since i've ergo'd out my workstation/kinesis and even cherry modding my mouse helped tremendously(i don't think people understand just how horrible micro switches are to your mousehand). There is blowback though, when i travel and use my netbook for a period longer than 2 hours, i start to wince in pain.

[absyrd]

I have been dealing with extreme tightness, swelling, and severe pain on my right side from my upper abdomen around to my back and hip and groin and down to my foot. So miserable. It has been over 2 years now, at least 10 family doc visits, 3 specialists, 3 MRI, 1 bonescan, 2 x-rays, EMG, pills after pills, injections, therapy... and literally have made ZERO progress on that front. Even more miserable. I have improved my daily living slightly through my own methods like building my wonderful standing desk (I posted pics of this in the "setup" thread), going through 20+ pairs of shoes to find the right ones to support me, and doing light yoga.

One of the possible causes of this chronic issue is having worked and played in the seated position, always leaning to my right side. I also haven't had full extension in my right elbow since I was a kid due to a bad dislocation and fracture (I also have ulnar nerve entrapment and they wanted to move it out of the badly damaged joint), so I literally short-arm everything on the right. After college for my job I was on the phone and PC 24/7 and obviously loved computers at home for gaming, art, reading, etc; I leaned right with my phone stuck to my ear, right to hold my mouse, right to write, and so on. One suggestion was made that I may have shortened up all the connective tissue and muscles on the right side of my body and, at one point, pulled on them very hard. They are trying to find the root of the problem but when pain is from your tits to toes, it is damn hard to tell. I also may have caused multiple injuries or one is creating the others because of imbalance. I can't remember what I did that brought it on initially, but it could have been something as simple as jumping upwards and reaching for something on a high shelf in the garage.

Moral to this story: maintain balance! Get up and move around every 10-15 minutes (even for just 5 seconds). If you can't, at least be aware of the way you sit and adjust it as much as you remember to. Your body is not meant to ever be locked in a certain position! Sedentary is bad!  Just be mindful of it (I don't think you need to go to any extremes) and I think you can help yourself avoid something horrible. This especially goes for young bucks who are still really developing!

[mkawa]

yep. i've had on and off carpal trouble, and the best thing period is to GET UP OFTEN

don't sit at the computer for hours on end. get up, walk around, stretch, warm up.

also work the crap out of your core when you work out. it's made a huge difference for me. so has a foam roller on my lower back

[Aseral]

I'v never had any injuries but I'm still quite young so I don't know what could happen in the future.
I'm pretty sure it would help A LOT if you guys worked out a bit. Besides streching and walking, do some resistance training and like mkawa said focus on your core and lower back. By making those muscles more active you will see progress in pain reduction and it will help prevent future injuries because your muscles will be handling more weight even while you sit and work.

[Lanx]

I have improved my daily living slightly through my own methods like building my wonderful standing desk (I posted pics of this in the "setup" thread), going through 20+ pairs of shoes to find the right ones to support me, and doing light yoga.

you try crocs? they're ugly as hell (but have now branched out to lots of fashion lines) i've read on forums ppl swear by them, and they're health approved by podatry ppl i think.

[Gerk]

I too have been all about ergonomics in my workstations for a long time (since at least the late 90's) and I make sure I get up and take breaks frequently.  Problem is when you're this far into an injury that's not enough ... but it's fantastic advice for preventative measures!  Looking at my paperwork I think that I'm technically suffering from Cubital Tunnel Syndrome -- I'm not sure if it's exactly the same as ulnar nerve displacement or they go hand-in-hand.  Just making sure my info is correct!

absyrd:  Honestly if my experience tells anything try a chiropractor instead of a family doctor.  25+ years of fumbles by the MD's in my case and it took the chiro one visit to nail it and within a few visits I'm already seeing signs of improvement.  My "re-injury" .. in other words what flared this all up again was also something simple ... overextending my arm to catch something someone tossed to me and I felt a 'pop' sort of feeling and the next day I was in wicked pain.  That was about 3 months ago now.

Lanx:  Yep he adjusted my back first visit which was great.

[Gerk]

I'v never had any injuries but I'm still quite young so I don't know what could happen in the future.
I'm pretty sure it would help A LOT if you guys worked out a bit. Besides streching and walking, do some resistance training and like mkawa said focus on your core and lower back. By making those muscles more active you will see progress in pain reduction and it will help prevent future injuries because your muscles will be handling more weight even while you sit and work.

Depends on your injuries I suppose .. it didn't help me much.  In fact with this type of injury it can be a bad thing in terms of my arm.  Push the wrong muscles, which are already putting pressure on my ulnar nerve, and it makes things potentially much worse.  in the more than two decades I've had these problems I've gone through periods where I did serious amounts of working out (power lifting very seriously for 6+ years) and none of that helped my problems.  As far as preventative though again I think that's probably a good idea, post injury I'd always consult a professional before changing up your routine.  Any serious trainer will tell you the same about injuries, they take a long long time to fully heal and they take one wrong move to re-injure or make worse.  Age comes into things as a factor as well.  Regardless of how good of shape you're in as you age you heal more slowly.

[absyrd]

you try crocs? they're ugly as hell (but have now branched out to lots of fashion lines) i've read on forums ppl swear by them, and they're health approved by podatry ppl i think.

I did! Hated them. My final decision was a Brooks Addiction with some added arch. They are made for people with severe pronation problems because they have an "anti roll bar"... literally no inward curve on the inside part of arch. They look awful but they help a tiny bit. I'll take what I can get.

I too have been all about ergonomics in my workstations for a long time (since at least the late 90's) and I make sure I get up and take breaks frequently.  Problem is when you're this far into an injury that's not enough ... but it's fantastic advice for preventative measures!  Looking at my paperwork I think that I'm technically suffering from Cubital Tunnel Syndrome -- I'm not sure if it's exactly the same as ulnar nerve displacement or they go hand-in-hand.  Just making sure my info is correct!

absyrd:  Honestly if my experience tells anything try a chiropractor instead of a family doctor.  25+ years of fumbles by the MD's in my case and it took the chiro one visit to nail it and within a few visits I'm already seeing signs of improvement.  My "re-injury" .. in other words what flared this all up again was also something simple ... overextending my arm to catch something someone tossed to me and I felt a 'pop' sort of feeling and the next day I was in wicked pain.  That was about 3 months ago now.

Lanx:  Yep he adjusted my back first visit which was great.

I think those two go hand-in-hand. Or one causes the other and vice-versa. All these names and diagnosis are so similar down to where they use in the thousandths in decimals to differentiate (I've seen a ton of scrips!).

As far as chiro goes, I'm not there yet. However, I am on a similar path; it is called osteopathic manipulative medicine. It is done by D.O.s where they literally manipulate your body back into homeostasis. They also provide tons of help on the mental aspects of dealing with pain both with and without meds. Luckily my particular insurance covers it under rehab (the insurance people had to really dig to find out... days of calling), and it will be my next step.


Again, threads like this could be helpful in preventing people, especially those invincible-feeling young adults (I was one), from doing harm by being sedentary or developing other bad habits. So cheers to you for starting it!

[Gerk]

Again, threads like this could be helpful in preventing people, especially those invincible-feeling young adults (I was one), from doing harm by being sedentary or developing other bad habits. So cheers to you for starting it!

Indeed, I was one myself.  Now ... not so much.  Older, wiser, and much more fragile!

For me it's a serious trifecta too ... typing, mousing, playing bass guitar -- all bad for my arm and all things I do professionally :/

[Lanx]

on the aspect of a chiro, i don't know if i "believe" in a chiro, i mean they aren't really medically approved right? there's no hard science about popping bones and cartilage, and to me it's really akin to acupuncture. I do think they use good science in imaging your spine (which is why i did go in the first place) but helping "align" my back and popping my finger joints just seemed like it didn't help much if any.

[Gerk]

on the aspect of a chiro, i don't know if i "believe" in a chiro, i mean they aren't really medically approved right? there's no hard science about popping bones and cartilage, and to me it's really akin to acupuncture. I do think they use good science in imaging your spine (which is why i did go in the first place) but helping "align" my back and popping my finger joints just seemed like it didn't help much if any.

Yep it depends on what you're doing with them I suppose.  I'm interested in the physio aspect of things more than anything else.  As far as "medically approved" that's hard to say.  They do get medial training, albeit not to the extent that an MD does.  I can tell you that the chiro I'm working with knows a hell of a lot more about my issue than my MD does, and to me that's the most important thing in this situation.  My MD (in fact several of them) were pretty clueless about the whole situation.

I feel much better after my back alignment .. but maybe that's just me.  I don't let the chiro pop my finger joints or anything like that -- for me it's all about working on the damaged muscles, tendons and tissues and getting things back in order.  A very good physiotherapist can do the same if you can find them, and have been referred to them after you've jumped through years of hoops through countless GP's and specialists.  I just skipped the queue on that front and am getting the physio I need to solve the issues that my doctor's couldn't (or couldn't be bothered) to diagnose properly.  Also worth noting is that in the 25+ years this has been a problem not a single MD or specialist actually got things right in terms of what was going on with my arm ... and there are clear cut ways to test this to show pretty conclusively the issue of the problem -- which my chiro did within 20 minutes on my first visit.  Had I waited on the MD's to get around to this, if they ever did, it would have been months or maybe even 1 year + to get to that point.  In fact it had already been almost 3 months and zero progress aside from being told to stop typing and find a new line of work.

[kaen]

i lost the feeling in my right hand for 2 years, it was just numb - like that feeling when you get dead legs after sitting on the toilet for 2 hours reading a book, you cant ****in walk for a good 5mins, imagine that but in your hand all the time. i was able to use a mouse but unable to hold a pen or put any force against my fingers without them crumbling, i had to learn to do many things left handed, it was pretty horrible, i still get terrible aches when typing or writing for any length of time, should probably see someone about it.

[Gerk]

i lost the feeling in my right hand for 2 years, it was just numb - like that feeling when you get dead legs after sitting on the toilet for 2 hours reading a book, you cant ****in walk for a good 5mins, imagine that but in your hand all the time. i was able to use a mouse but unable to hold a pen or put any force against my fingers without them crumbling, i had to learn to do many things left handed, it was pretty horrible, i still get terrible aches when typing or writing for any length of time, should probably see someone about it.

Yes you should!  Don't let things like that go untreated .. the longer you leave it go the more potential for permanent damage there is.  I'm up against the fact that my hand muscles have probably started actually atrophying -- which could mean no chance at full recovery and having this issue for the rest of my life.

[eth0s]

@ Gerk:  You're first doctor was correct, the only real treatment for a repetitive stress injury like yours is rest.  Like 3 months (or more) of absolutely no typing.  I realize this may sound impossible given your work situation, but if there is any way for you to take a 3-month disability leave, either through disability insurance, or through your Canadian health care system (which I know very little about actually), then you should really consider doing it.  Otherwise you will continue to be plagued by pain.   The injury to your hands is mainly a nerve injury, and probably involves aggrieved tendons and ligaments.  And an extended period of total rest can dramatically improve this type of injury.  Additionally, I seriously doubt there is any muscle involvement, although there may be some fasciitis.  If you are still using your hands, there would be very little muscle atrophy as well.  But even if you do experience some muscle atrophy in the future, it is not really a serious concern since you can build muscle back rather quickly with proper physio-therapy, but only after your nerves, tendons and ligaments are allowed to rest, recover and de-sensitize.  So my recommendation would be to not use a computer keyboard for a significant length of time.  How can you manage this?  The best option of course, would be to simply hire somebody to do your typing, which is expensive, but not as expensive as you might think.  Voice recognition software is a second option.  The only other option is some kind of extended disability leave from work, if you can find somebody to pay for it.  In the USA, if you have good insurance, you would be able to receive up to 80% of your pay for such an injury through a disability insurance claim.  The other option in the USA would be a worker's compensation claim against your employer, but I have no idea how your system works in Canada, so it might be time for you to consult a Canadian disability attorney, as well as a disability doctor (for a disability evaluation and a certified report).  Otherwise I would say investigate ergo-keyboards.  For standard keyboards, the lowest stress keyboard that I have is my Realforce 87U silent with variable keys.  It's a very low stress keyboard.  But it is probably not enough to "cure" your current injury.

[Gerk]

ethos:  I did 2 months of rest (as in no work and very minimal typing).  Did nothing to help things.  My issue is directly related to two muscle groups and related tendons in my arm (not my hand) which are both seriously messed and putting pressure on my ulnar nerve ... all the rest in the world won't resolve this from what I've been told and backed up by doing my own research.

Sadly I'm self-employed so I don't have the option of doing workman's compensation or anything of the like .. and I'm really not interested in suing myself

Lastly in just under 2 weeks getting physio there has already been a HUGE improvement in my condition, so I have faith that I'm on the right path here, but thanks for your input.

[Gerk]

Also of note, this is seemingly not an RSI (but repetitive stress has aggravated it).  This injury all seems to stem back to an injury I had 25+ years ago that was not properly treated for and has been slowly getting worse over the whole time (I messed up my arm badly and damaged those two muscle groups, which never properly healed -- or at least that's everyone's best guess at this point).

My previous doctor was honestly an asshat.  He also mis-diagnosed me on another much more critical issue that ended up landing me in the hospital for a short stay that could have been completely avoided had I been diagnosed correctly.  He's done swings and misses several times in fact all along those lines ... he's incredibly lazy.  When I complained about him last week to the clinic he works out of I was told that there have been a lot of complaints against him.  He's lucky I'm not the type to sue, as the problem he misdiagnosed and subsequently improperly medicated me for that landed me in the hospital had some serious malpractice potential ... you would think that I would have learned from that experience .... hah.

[hoggy]

Reduced nerve mobility - I get strange sensations in my hands that's a cross between running water and an electric shock.

Physio has really helped me over the past few years.  The kinesio tape is great, but watch out for your skin, I had blisters from a reaction to the glue a few months back.  Other manufacturers exist - my physio has moved to levotape.

I agree with the comments about building up core muscles.  If you've got other problems then consider getting one of the slendertone belt things (don't cheap out on your self on this one - pay the money) - it'll help you with your core without troubling other issues.

The biggest change I've gone through is trying to reduce how 'busy' I am, but trying to rescue the productivity.  No-one (and I mean no-one) cares how your work was entered.  If you typed it, pasted it, generated it, hell contract it out - trust me - no one cares.  Typing is now your biggest expense.  Macros are suddenly an investment.  Save snippets of your work and re-use ruthlessly.  Just imagine how much nicer it would be be if you typed in your final version on the first try - just think it through before you type.

[Gerk]

Unfortunately for me as a coder any of the dictation options are pretty much useless.  Trying to "speak" code is truly horrible ... I did try that when I first ran into this issue a few months back but the results were pretty terrible.  I re-use as much as I possibly can but so much of the work involves custom stuff that it's pretty hard for most things :/

[hoggy]

Sounds like we're on the same road...

I tried speaking code too.  Not good.

You could try something like phrase express.  I use it for things like variable declaration
ds- becomes Dim str As String    and it will place the cursor just after str
Comment blocks, loops, common keywords -
forl- becomes for lngcount=0 to lngubound
ei- becomes End If (it gets used a lot)
You can get started slowly and reap (admittedly small) gains in minutes.

[lorem3k]

This one time I got my finger stuck in the CD drive...

[kaen]

Unfortunately for me as a coder any of the dictation options are pretty much useless.  Trying to "speak" code is truly horrible ... I did try that when I first ran into this issue a few months back but the results were pretty terrible.  I re-use as much as I possibly can but so much of the work involves custom stuff that it's pretty hard for most things :/

That was my job, coding - i had to give it up. Serious rest was the only thing that helped my hand recover, and i stopped gaming for years.

[Gerk]

Yep no more gaming for me either.  I'm playing it all by ear at this point and seeing how these physio sessions play out.  So far it has done wonders for me .. still taking it very easy as far as typing goes.  The doc actually encouraged some typing, as long as I don't do long sessions and I don't mouse with my right arm.

[mkawa]

trackpoint?

also eth0s is 100% correct for soft tissue injuries (most RSIs)

[Gerk]

trackpoint?

also eth0s is 100% correct for soft tissue injuries (most RSIs)

I hate trackpoint devices personally.  I'm using a trackpad and/or a mouse currently with my left hand and doing well with it.