Repetitive Stress Injury
Repetitive stress injury (RSI) is often the cause for wrist pain. It can occur at any time and affect any one in today’s 
modern world. Your hands are critical to for basic survival, work, communication, recreation and even creative expression. Any injury to your hand or wrist can have a widespread negative impact on your daily life and the healing process can sometimes elude you. Since many of our daily activities and interactions involve repetitive movements (texting, typing, or computer use), repetitive stress injury can result. Many wrist problems such as carpal tunnel, de quervain’s tendinitis and wrist tendonitis are due to repetitive stress. You can read more about carpal tunnel syndrome here in the recent blog I wrote. Yoga can be quite beneficial in providing relief from wrist pain due to RSI.
Wrist Pain and Repetitive Stress Injury
Wrist pain due to RSI occurs from the continuous and excessive stress placed on the structures in the wrist. Many time poor postural habits and well as poor workplace ergonomics contribute to RSI. There are many problems that poor posture can cause that I covered in last week’s blog on neck pain. But when the shoulders and upper back don’t provide the strong support as a base for the arm movements then extra stress is placed on the smaller joints of the hand and wrist.
This can cause wrist pain by requiring these smaller joints to do more work than they are designed for. In addition, the poor postural alignment can also constrict the nerves and blood vessels in the arms which can lead to further issues and wrist pain. Yoga can help wrist pain and assist in the healing of RSI in the wrists by improving alignment in the upper body and increasing the flexibility in the wrist with better support and guided movements. Yoga further helps us to engage in our daily activities with less stress and improved movement patterns. It addresses the causes of injury by slowing down and observing ourselves and our habitual patterns. Then we can develop new patterns of movement that are more conscious and healthier for us.
Wrist Stretch Yoga Pose
The wrist stretch yoga pose will help to alleviate wrist pain due to RSI by opening up the tight structures in the wrist, elbows and shoulders that have become tight from repetitive movements. It also will help to promote improved posture and strengthen the upper back to provide a strong stable base for the hands to work from. Click here to watch the video of the wrist stretch yoga pose.
Yoga Can Help You Heal
Yoga has been shown to be an effective method to help your body heal itself naturally. At Flex Physical Therapy, we are experts in using proven yoga poses to help our patient’s heal from repetitive stress injury and wrist pain. We have a hand specialist who is specially trained to treat all elbow, wrist, and hand injuries. We also offer regular yoga classes on Tuesday/Thursday nights and Saturday mornings. Click here for information on our Yoga classes. Do not let your wrist pain become chronic as chronic pain is directly linked to increased rates of cancer and depression. Contact us now at 1-800-930-8803 and start you way to living a healthier and more balance life today!
