Conditions and injuries of the finger, hand, wrist, forearm and elbow: what they are, how they behave, and when they stop being minor.
The best thumb base arthritis exercises are a web space stretch, a round O pinch and gentle holds, once or twice a day, pain-free. Skip putty and heavy pinch; joint protection does even more.
A wrist that clicks or pops without pain is almost always harmless. A click with pain, swelling, weakness or a clunk after a fall is a structure moving, and the location tells you which one.
Thumb pain from phone use is a load problem: handset weight, thumb reach and repetitions. Where it hurts tells you which structure is involved, and four changes settle most cases within weeks.
A trigger finger splint holds the big knuckle straight (about 0 to 15 degrees) at night for 6 to 10 weeks, with tendon glides 3 times a day. How to fit it, what to avoid, and when splinting stops being the answer.
Leave a ganglion alone if it’s painless and changes size; around half go away on their own. Treat it if it hurts, limits movement or presses on a nerve, knowing aspiration often refills and surgery isn’t recurrence-free.
Tennis elbow exercises work in stages: isometric holds, then slow wrist lifts and eccentrics at 3 sets of 15, then heavier and slower. Up to 3/10 pain is fine if it settles by morning; most improvement shows in weeks 6 to 12.
Tendon glides and gentle median nerve glides, 5 to 10 slow rounds 2 to 3 times a day alongside a night splint, help early carpal tunnel. Wrist stretches and grip strengtheners make it worse, and constant numbness means exercises are the wrong tool.
Often, yes. Most trigger fingers caught at the click stage settle without surgery with a night splint for 6 to 10 weeks, less hard gripping and sometimes one injection. The odds drop once the finger locks.
Hands numb at night are almost always a compressed nerve, most often carpal tunnel. Which fingers go numb tells you which nerve and where, and a neutral night splint settles most early cases.
Most desk-related hand and wrist pain eases once you change the dose: short breaks every 30 minutes, a looser mouse grip and one matched piece of equipment. No change by about 6 weeks means get it diagnosed.