Tingling & Pain in your hands can come from the shoulder
This is for anyone who has had tingling and pain in their hands. While many of what we see in our practice is tendon related, we have also seen shoulder-related symptoms that I'll be discussing in this post
A few key points that you’ll pick up from this story (that is still ongoing)
- You have to be patient
- Targeting the RIGHT problem early on will save you a lot of stress and confusion
- Issues can come from the shoulder, not just the hands itself
Recently I’ve been working with a professional esports athlete who had reported three major regions of discomfort.
You can see them labeled below.
P1 was described as prickly and tingling, While P2 & P3 were more sore / sharp type of pain.
Unfortunately this individuals journey to me was not straightforward as most of these cases aren’t.
Here is a quick overview
- This individual had been dealing with the issue for 4 months and got to a point where the individual could barely use her hands more than 15 minutes without the pain or tingling
- Saw physical therapists, doctors, orthopedic surgeons, got imaging done (ultrasound + MRI) to find nothing both at the wrist & neck. Their main approach was to completely take a break from gaming (facepalm)
- After several cycles of those the the pain got worse and worse, likely because the problem was not being addressed
After a more in-depth evaluation I was able to find that
P1 was coming from the shoulders, specifically irritation from tightness in her pec minor.
P2 & P3 were from tendon issues of her wrist & hands.. and they were extremely weak.
So we focused on a program that targeted the areas of tightness, weakness & poor endurance that we found.
It is now 11 weeks later of consistent endurance training, schedule progression and this individual can now tolerate...
14 hours over the week of activity with her wrist & hand with no pain.
Were you expecting more progress? This is massve improvement in this individual's specific case
I really wanted to share this case because this really emphasizes that EVERYONE is different. and everyone will have differences in how they progress with their injury.
Often times the recovery period can be shortened SIGNIFICANTLY if the problem is appropriately identified early on.
But most of the time people go through 4-7 providers before they get to 1HP.
This requires a lot of “untangling” of harmful beliefs that likely led to real changes in our pain system (nervous & immune). Check out the article hyperlinked to learn a bit more about why that happens.
So throughout these 11 weeks, there was alot of discussion to help this individual understand why the approach was going to benefit them and why some of the previous experiences she had led to the poor outcomes.
Getting clarity and confidence from the healthcare provider you work with is essential.
Again, this is why I wanted to share this story with you all.
To let you know that tingling can be addressed if you target the problem at the actual cause.
To be patient with the process especially if you have been dealing with it for awhile and have seen many providers who haven’t provided you with any helpful guidance.
And lastly that there’s hope. Over the past 8 years we have seen this many times.
With different situations and timelines for recovery.
Simple cases behave more predictably but once someone has seen multiple doctors or providers who seemingly can't figure out what's going on. That is when the timeline can be extended.
Working with someone who can help you figure that out is essential. As early as possible.
Posted Nov 5, 2024, 1:09 AM UTC