Wrist Range of Motion
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I've been suffering chronic wrist pain for a year now. I'm still not sure if it's arthritis, some sort of tendinitis, or both.
An x-ray showed no arthritis and an MRI showed no arthritis but did show dorsal intercalated segmental instability (DISI). Despite what I read online– that this is caused by hand or leads to arthritis– my ortho says this may be a red herring and maybe congenital. I never had an injury to the wrist. The pain I have doesn't seem to be centered over this area.
The specific question I have here is whether or not some sort of tendinopathy itself can cause reduced range of motion in the wrist. I have discovered that while I can bend my left hand forward nearly 90°, on the right side of the range of motion is severely restricted– more like 40°. Furthermore, stretching the wrist in that direction inevitably causes pain and leads to swelling in the wrist/forearm.
I've been wearing a splint on that wrist at least 12 hours a day for the past several months as well. Could this lead to reduced range of motion?
I think rather worried about this since I discovered just how poor the range of motion is recently.
My appointment with the ortho is a ways off. So, can someone tell me if what I'm describing can be caused by something other than arthritis?
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loxie PaulF1970
Posted
I was diagnosed with what my doctor said was tenosynovitis in both wrists/base thumb joints many many years ago. At the time it became very bad and I found myself unable to do a whole range of things and was in constant high level pain. He told me that tendonitis and tenosynovitis are 'self determining' ie, that it would come and go and I'd have good and bad periods. It got far worse before I managed to get it under control. I had a few years of less problems then it started up again and got really painful all over again. My current doctor said it was OA in the base of thumb and it was 'my age' - poppycock I said, I had it in my thirties and nobody did anything about it, now suddenly its an age thing..... Anyhow, all that was offered was Tramadol, something I cant take, so I decided to find my own way of dealing. I tried splints but they were firstly cumbersome, uncomfortable and really didnt prevent the pain in the slightest. I looked for more natural ways of easing the discomfort and ended up with ginger - I mince or grate fresh ginger and mix it with hand cream, schmear it on both thumbs and wrists then put on a thin pair of cotton gloves and leave it on overnight whilst sleeping. By morning its a million per cent improved and now the swelling seems to have gone down completely and most of the time I'm able to use the hands and thumbs normally with only the occasional ache or sometimes pain if I've over used them or done something needing a lot of gripping, like gardening for example. Success. I've avoided surgery because I've heard so many horror stories and the recovery time is huge. At present I'm coping very well without either surgery or even splints, so hopefully I've found the best way to manage the problem for my circumstances.