Bird Senter

[BillG_in_TX]

Bird,

Sorry to hear your hands are bothering you again. If it's any comfort, my wife has had both wrists operated on, and one of them has been operated on twice. She is now pain free. The second operation on her right wrist was very successful, and her surgeon says that the success rate is much higher now that they have pefected the techniques (and had more practice /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif).

 

[DocHeb]

Now that I know Bird is OK, I don't feel quite as bad about "tangenting" this thread.

Carpal Tunnel is a pretty wicked problem for folks that use their hands. I can remember my dad painting houses in the summer (he was a schoolteacher), and his hands would get so numb he'd just duct-tape the brushes to his hand so he wouldn't have to grip (not that he could grasp anything anyway).

Rather then reinventing the wheel, I'll point you to <A target="_blank" HREF=http://my.webmd.com/encyclopedia/article/2945.2173>WebMD - Carpal Tunnel</A> for some background information and pics. There are additional pages listed to the right of the screen that give further information and treatment options. Doctors should generally recommend the least invasive measures first.

If you haven't tried splints at night, you might do so. The splints can decrease the nightime burning, and can make the next day better. Some splints are pretty short & wimpy - get a brand that extends a good distance up your forearm.

There was just an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association September 11, 2002, <A target="_blank" HREF=http://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v288n10/abs/joc20494.html>Splinting vs Surgery in the Treatment of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome</A>. This article compared surgery to splinting for relief. Persons that had surgery did better in the long run.

Anything you can do to decrease the bending of the wrist (especially in a repeating fashion) will help.

<font color=blue>"But I've done work for doctors. I've got to see what they're like when they're left to their own vices. I've had to fix what they've broken." </font color=blue>

Being a doctor requires a bit of "I'm always right" personality. If not, that doctor could never make a decision. The doctors that carry this attitude into fields where they have no experience are the ones that mess up like you mentioned. Find somebody that you can trust, get second opinions, and talk to others that have had the surgery. Ask the surgeon how many procedures he's done. "A man's gotta know his limitations" applies to doctors as well as Clint.

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>am I to understand they are bothering you again? I thought the surgery gave a more permanent fix than that.</font color=blue>

Yep, Chris, they've been bothering me again, but not nearly as severely as before, so I'm just taking it a little easier to try not to aggravate the condition. The doctor told me before the surgery that if you go back to doing the same things you had been doing, it could flare up again, especially typing and/or using anything with any vibration to it, such as chain saws, string trimmers, mowers, etc. As for fishing causing the problem; I can believe that. As the doctor said, overdoing any repetitious activity with your hands. When I first heard of carpal tunnel syndrome, I thought it was nearly exclusively typists, but he says he's operated on airline baggage handlers, mechanics, and lots of people from other occupations. (The guy who installed my aerobic sewer system had had that surgery done).

As the doctor says, when it starts to bother you quit what you're doin'. Do those jobs in moderation if you just have to do them.

Incidentally, my youngest daughter had the surgery when she was 28 years old, and her employer was one of those that considered it a job related injury and paid for it, but the doctor told me that was what they thought for many years, but now think it also may be hereditary. May be something to that, since my mother, my daughter, and I have all had it done. Of course, it got my daughter at age 28, me at age 57, and mother at age 74; so I have no explanation for that difference.

 

[BillG_in_TX]

<font color=blue>Being a doctor requires a bit of "I'm always right" personality.</font color=blue>

My brother (an OB-GYN) refers to this as the MDeity syndrome./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif.
As an aside, I'm the only man I know whose PCP (primary care physician) is an OB-GYN./w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>my wife has had both wrists operated on, and one of them has been operated on twice. She is now pain free. The second operation on her right wrist was very successful</font color=blue>

Bill, my mother just had to have the surgery on one hand (left hand; she's lefthanded) and the first surgery did not help a bit even immediately after having it. Then my daughter talked her into going to our doctor and he re-did it and fixed it. Simply put, she just got a doctor who didn't know how and did it wrong the first time.

However, I think I used as good a hand surgeon as you could find, and even he says he's done some more than once. I think he was talking about fools like me who go back to doing what they were doing to cause the problem in the first place instead of him not doing it right./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

 

[Bird]

Very well put, Chris (DocHeb). I like your entire message with just one caveat:

<font color=blue>If you haven't tried splints at night, you might do so. The splints can decrease the nightime burning, and can make the next day better. Some splints are pretty short & wimpy - get a brand that extends a good distance up your forearm.</font color=blue>

Absolutely right, if the problem is not too severe. I've been using mine some nights and lately I've been using them when mowing and tilling with a walk behind tiller. They are a big help. However, if the problem gets severe enough, they're no help at all. We tried them before the surgery 5 years ago and there was no way I could keep them on for more than a few minutes at a time. I know they say it helps to limit the movement of the wrist, but if the problem is severe enough, you will get those things off and move that wrist around 'cause you won't be able to tolerate the pain otherwise. Moving the wrist around may only provide relief for a matter of minutes, or even just seconds, but it's better than no relief at all.

 

[jimmoore]

Ahh, come on Bird, As one old COP to another. It's caused from holding a doughnut in one hand and a cup of coffe in the other for sooo many years . Ha ha. Best wishes for a speedy recovery.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Thanks Doc and Bird.

I didn't know I had a problem until these nagging chest pains and pains in my arms etc. I went to the doc and he sent me to some kind of specialist. They wanted to check out the nerves or something with this test where they put needles here and time the electric tingle to there kind of deal.

The first thing the doc had done was a spinal xray and that had shown him that I had some pretty bad calcium deposits or some such. He thought that was the source of my problem.

After the tests with the specialist the called me in and explained that him and the specialist agreed the best treatment was surgery.

I guess I could have saved the doc some tests if I'd mentioned the hands being numb ninety percent of the time. But I didn't. I figured it was just something you have when you mature. Sorta like today buying 1.75 diopter cheaters for the hood to replace the 1.50's that have been in there for years. (It was neat looking at the chart on the cheater package and seeing that I've got the eyes of a man half my way to fifty, They said 1.75's for those fifty two and I'm fifty four/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif.)

One thing I've noticed is I've got my dad's pain tolerance. I can remember him when I was young getting hurt and carrying on like it was nothing while there I'd be wanting to crawl under the bed cause it hurt me to just see it.

Now I understand that he wasn't so tough. It just didn't hurt as bad as I thought it would.

Seriously my dad is one heckuva man. At seventy six he can outwork most guys a third his age.

 

[Alan L.]

Good to have you on here checking the board, Bird. I hope tractorless life is treating you OK.

My mother is 80 and she had carpal tunnel surgery about 15 or 20 years ago. She worked on an assembly line at Texas Instruments for many years, and figures thats what caused it.

I type and use a mouse alot at work, as many of us probably do. Sometimes my wrists get fatigued, but I haven't had any pain to speak of. Sounds like something I don't want to get.

W Harv, I find many doctors want to do surgery for back problems that cause numbness, etc., but everything I read is that surgery is a last resort. Especially for disk problems, which resolve themselves most of the time.

 

[Bird]

Jim, there may be more to that than you realize; the coffee cup part, at least./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif But I'm using the lightest weight cup in the house./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Wroughtn Harv and Alan, fatigue and numbness are just the beginning, and I never considered them to be a problem. It only becomes a "problem" when the pain won't let you sleep.

Incidentally, after a year of tests, many, many doctor and lab visits, and thousands of dollars, the doctors have finally decided one of my wife's problems is vitamin B12 anemia. After only 3 weekly injections, she says the pains she's long had in her legs are much better.

And now our youngest daughter, who's been going through multiple tests for months for chronic and almost constant nausea and constipation, finally got bad enough to have to go to the hospital emergency room and was admitted yesterday. Let's see . . . so far they thought it was just a virus, or maybe food poisoning, no, must be gall stones, no, there are gall stones, but that's not what's causing the problems, it's an ulcer . . . well, no, the ulcer wouldn't cause what now appears to be a complete intestinal blockage. So they admitted her to the hospital, but haven't done anything except make an x-ray and the doctor will be in sometime after noon today to tell her what they'd like to do next.

I guess if the doctors don't kill us outright, they figure the least they can do is wipe us all out financially.