Another senseless Linux-related injury...

[James Knott]

As always, you're free to get another opinion.

Peter King wrote:
> For the past few weeks I've been having the classic Carpal Tunnel
> Syndrome: transient tingling, numbness, burning in the thumb, index,
> and middle finger of the hand, with some associated shooting pains
> up the forearm. I had a bout of this four years ago, which led to my
> learning to touch-type; splinting the wrist and relaxing it for a few
> days helped alleviate the pain. This time it's much worse and seems 
> rebarbative.
> 
> I went to my doctor, who diagnosed CTS and ordered up blood tests and
> nerve conduction tests to be sure, but then *immediately* began to
> talk about surgery. Everything I've read on the Net says that surgery
> really ought to be a last resort, only after six months to a year of
> working with "conservative" (non-interventionist) therapies. Plus the
> fact that I don't really want my carpal ligament severed.
> 
> It struck me that this group must have a fair amount of collective
> experience with this medical problem, and, just possibly, also have
> some collective wisdom about how to deal with it. I don't need medical
> information; I have all that. What I want to know is what people have
> tried and how successful (or not) it may have been -- anecdotal reports
> are just the ticket. I'll pay for the physiotherapy if that's the way to
> go; I want this problem *gone*.
> 
> What I've tried to date: wrist splinting, either all day or at night only,
> both apparently ineffective; strong doses of ibuprofen as anti-inflammatory;
> lightening up (but not swearing off) keyboarding; and extensive complaining.
> 

--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml