Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

[Bryan Dreyfus]

I have been losing feeling and control in my hnads for some time steadily growing worse over months.

I just got diagnosed with Bilateral Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and was given a 50/50 chance it will be taken care after a 3 month dual forearm wrist splint.

My question: Has anyone had any experience with this? If the splints don't work (50/50 according to doc) does the surgery offer a return to sleight of hand?

I have been retired from standing for more than 5 minutes and then it's sit in my wheelchair or fall down in agony but I still don't want to stop performing close-up for friends, family and maybe offering a higher quality of performance video files to show what it "should" look like (by my standards anyway).

So, anyone with any experience please resopnd with your own prognosis.

Bryan

[Jim Riser]

Been there, done that..last April and May.

See:
http://www.jamesriser.com/Carpal/Tunnel.html
for more info.
Jim

[Ken Becker]

Fantastic report. But then, what less would you expect from Mr. Riser! :) :) :)

[Richard Kaufman]

I looked at Jim Riser's report and it made me feel faint.

[Bryan Dreyfus]

Wow! I went to look at the report and got page cant be displayed. I am an inquisitive type so I just went to his main site and no good their either. Then I went "one step further" (catchy line heh?) and typed in http://jamesriser.com with no backslash and got a message from his server that it is down till sunday 9 am est.

Now that my curiosity has been slated I can wiat patiently to read/see it.

Thanx for response,

Bryan

[Bryan Dreyfus]

I have had the "surgical center" experience with a knee surgery a couple of years ago. I found the same general results as you describe.

Except when I was coming out of the anesthetic I wanted to get up and go home so i had a nurse throw herself over my chest to hold me down..I guess, by reports, that I was slightly, verbally, abusive which embarrassed me to no end. I was told gently that it was alright.

I was told not to eat for a couple of hours so the first place i told my driver to go was the nearest McDonalds....all was good with the world.

Sounds like the surgery would be what i would like done right away so I can get to the healing process...three months with splints that go 2/3 of the way up my forearm will not be fun.

Thanx for the report, James.

Bryan

[Pete Biro]

I didn't have carpel tunnel... but had Polio, which paralyzed my right side from the waist up (thanks for not getting my leg)... got it the week before the Salk Vaccine became available.

The limits use of my right arm, but I work around it.

Then, a few years ago I developed 9N BOTH HANDS... Dupeytron's Contracture of the ring fingers.

What that is is a vine that grows inside your hand around a tendon then it pulls it back and your finger(s) curl in and you can't uncurl them.

One Christmas I was trying to entertain with my Slyndi-learned coins through the table and I couldn't pick the coins up off the table my hand's had gotten so bad.

I then decied that was it... went to an orthodpedic surgeon and had my right hand done. In a few months of therapy it came back to about 90-percent. As soon as it was healed I did the left hand, and that has come back about 80% (because it was six or more months later to do the surgury).

I don't want to be a whiner, but I also have arthritis in both wrists and just by typing this long a message I can hardly keep typing, so... bye bye for now.. :cool:

[Joe Hanosek]

I've had great results from deep tissue massage of my hands and forearms on a regular basis.

[Guest]

I have suffered from CTS for several years without surgery, I personally don't recommend surgery - pain is something to let your mind know that your body is doing something it shouldn't be doing. Rather than cut myself open, I perfer to listen to my body and figure out what I am doing wrong and make changes.

In my case, it was bad typing habits ... after lowering my keyboard and adjusting my monitor, the numbness stopped - in six months time I don't have many problems with it. A nice alternative to going under the knife. Sometimes it flares up with extended typing sessions, so I try to limit my typing time - the only drawback magically is I can't do the muscle pass anymore.

To deal with the pain in the short term, braces help a little ... but ice works the best. Put your hand under cold running water. There is this stuff called "Tiger Balm" sold at GNC and WalMary that works miracles for things like CTS and pinched nerves.

JoeJoe

[Bryan Dreyfus]

I am considering the need for surgery after my doc tor said That the splints I wear on each wrist have a 50/50 success rate.

As it stood when I decided to see a doctor: I play my guitar for 5 minutes and my left hand went numb..you may think that feeling nothing would help but it also makes knowing where you have your fingers on the strings impossible too.

Five minutes of performing with cards or other small props and my hands would go numb...it isn't just a minor inconvenience to me it is making the few things I find enjoyable a painful impossibility. Now, if in the middle of a card trick, dropping the deck gets to be in vogue I may rethink it but I doubt that will happen.

Bryan