Wrist & Hand Pain
Dr. Bajaj and the team at Remedy Spine & Pain Solutions in Marina del Rey, California, provide Los Angeles-based patients with opportunities to relieve elbow and wrist pain. Because these joints are so vital to daily life, they are often a source of discomfort.
Symptoms of Wrist & Hand Pain
- Dull, aching sensation
- Stiffness
- Loss of mobility
- Loss of flexibility
- Joint pain
- Tingling and numbness
- Weakness
- Pain while bending your fingers
- Pain while making a fist
- Pain while turning the wrist
Causes of Wrist & Hand Pain
Osteoarthritis
The soft, viscous, and slippery cartilage around the joints acts like cushions, allowing the joints to glide across each other easily without friction. Osteoarthritis is a condition wherein injuries or age-related factors make the cartilage disintegrate or break down, increasing the friction caused by joint movements. This leads to discomfort, pain, and swelling.
Wrist Tendonitis
Tendons are the thick and fibrous cords that connect the muscles to the bones. Tendonitis is a condition wherein repetitive movements, and injuries can make the tendons rub against other tissues and get inflamed, leading to pain, tenderness, and swelling.
De Quervain’s Tenosynovitis
De Quervain’s tenosynovitis, also known as radial styloid tenosynovitis, is a painful condition that affects the tendons around the thumbs. This usually happens due to repetitive hand or wrist movements, and its common symptoms include pain and tenderness below the thumb.
Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
Carpal tunnel syndrome, also known as median nerve compression, is a condition wherein a pinched nerve in the wrist leads to numbness and tingling sensations. This usually happens when the median nerve running through the carpal tunnel passage in the wrist is pinched due to repetitive motions, injuries, or underlying conditions.
Trigger Finger
Trigger finger is a condition wherein the tendons in the fingers become inflamed due to arthritis, diabetes, or repetitive motions with the hands. Consequently, the affected finger becomes stuck in a bent position. You might notice popping or clicking sensations when you try straightening the finger.
Ganglion Cysts
Ganglion cysts are non-cancerous fluid-filled sacs that develop on the tendons or joints of the wrists. While the cyst itself is painless, it can cause pain and discomfort if it pinches or compresses a nerve. In some cases, the cyst can also interfere with joint movements.
Diagnosing Wrist & Hand Pain
Remedy Pain Solutions always diagnoses and treats the root cause of wrist and hand pain instead of masking the symptoms. We believe in combining immediate pain relief with long-term solutions, and that can only be achieved by understanding the locus of your wrist pain. Our interventional pain specialists discuss your symptoms, review your health history, and perform a physical examination.
During the examination, we check for swellings, pain, trigger points, and mobility issues to formulate a basic hypothesis. Finally, we administer imaging tests, such as CT scans, ultrasounds, x-rays, and MRIs, to visualize the underlying bones, joints, tendons, and cartilage. Our advanced diagnostic tools allow us to identify the root cause of your wrist and hand pain and curate the appropriate treatment plan.
Interventional Treatments for Wrist & Hand Pain
Remedy Pain Solutions is the leading medical center for minimally-invasive interventional and regenerative treatments. We avoid surgeries because they’re unnecessarily complex and risky, and we avoid narcotic solutions because they simply mask the symptoms for a brief period. Our treatments are always curated to provide immediate pain relief while encouraging your body to heal itself from the inside out.
Our treatments often include local injections, such as epidural injections, to reduce inflammation in your wrist joints and provide immediate pain relief. We also provide regenerative treatments, like PRP, to make your body heal the damaged joints, ligaments, tendons, or cartilages. PRP treatments use your body’s natural growth factors to heal your internal problems, leading to lasting relief.
Elbow & Wrist Pain Q&A
What is the source of elbow pain?
People use their arms and hands for all kinds of tasks throughout any given day. It is no wonder that the elbow joints can become overtaxed, leading to considerable pain. While traumatic injury can cause pain in the elbows, the most common source of pain in these joints is repetitive stress injury. When the tendons in the elbow become inflamed, the condition is known as tendinitis, more commonly referred to as “tennis elbow.” Any repetitive gripping motion can cause tendinitis, even if the use of a tennis racquet is not a factor. In fact, tendinitis in the elbow is often the result of motions related to a patient’s job, not sporting activities.
What causes most types of wrist pain?
Wrist pain is also commonly caused by repetitive stress injuries, such as typing on a computer keyboard for prolonged periods of time. Carpal tunnel syndrome is a condition that develops when too much pressure is placed on the nerve that runs through the carpal tunnel, a corridor that passes through the palm side of the wrist. Carpal tunnel syndrome can be extremely painful, and many patients must seek treatment in order to continue with their normal daily activities. Patients who are suffering from wrist pain should take action before the condition worsens.
What are some of the treatments for elbow and wrist pain?
Studies have shown that platelet-rich plasma therapy has been an effective treatment for tennis elbow and other conditions in the elbow joint. The treatment uses the patient’s own blood to create a platelet-rich solution, which is then injected back into the body at the source of the pain. This plasma is full of natural compounds that speed the healing process, which reduces the experience of pain. PRP therapy is also promising for treating tendinitis in the wrists. At Remedy Spine & Pain Solutions, treatment of wrist and elbow pain always begins with a comprehensive exam and diagnostic efforts. Once the source of pain has been identified, a plan of action is designed and implemented.
