How We Can Help Relieve Your Carpal Tunnel Pain

Nagging pain in your wrist, numbness and tingling in your fingers — these are the hallmarks of carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS), and they’re anything but comfortable. And you’re not alone if you’ve developed this common joint issue. Carpal tunnel syndrome affects up to 5% of the population, with women outpacing men by 3 to

1.Given its prevalence, the team here at Valiant Life Medical has seen our fair share of carpal tunnel issues. As a result, we've come up with some best practices for relieving the pain and other symptoms that can make using your hand challenging.

Carpal tunnel syndrome at a glance

In order to appreciate how we go about treating CTS, it’s useful to understand what drives this condition. As the name suggests, your carpal tunnel is a passageway on the underside of your wrist that’s about an inch wide. The sides and floor of this tunnel are made up of tiny carpal bones and a tough ligament acts as the roof.

Making good use of this tunnel is your median nerve, which controls the sensation in most of your fingers and controls the muscles around the base of your thumb. In addition to your median nerve, nine flexor tendons that allow movement in your fingers also traverse this space.

CTS occurs when the outer lining of the tendons (synovium) becomes inflamed, which presses up against your median nerve. This compression can lead to pain, as well as numbness and tingling, in your hand. The longer it goes untreated, the more potential there is for permanent nerve damage.

Solutions for your carpal tunnel syndrome

There are several ways we can help relieve the symptoms of your carpal tunnel syndrome, such as:

Joint injections

Our first goal is to get you comfortable, which means reducing the inflammation in your carpal tunnel. We can accomplish this with joint injections, such as corticosteroid injections that tackle the pain and inflammation in one shot.

Bracing

One of our most effective solutions is to outfit you with a brace that keeps your wrist straight, especially at night when you sleep. This can help greatly with the inflammation and allows more space for healing.
Physical therapy

Another key to treating CTS is through physical therapy (PT). With PT, we provide you with targeted nerve-gliding exercises that can help free up your median nerve. As important, during your PT sessions, we show you ways to avoid CTS in the future by making some adjustments to how you use and support your wrist.

Platelet-rich plasma therapy

We’ve also had success with regenerative medicine for treating CTS. Using platelet-rich plasma therapy, we provide resources that help control the inflammation, which relieves your symptoms.

As you can see, we certainly don't lack options when it comes to treating CTS, and we’re sure to have the right combination for your wrist pain.

To figure out which approach is best for your carpal tunnel syndrome, please contact our office in Fort Worth, Texas, to schedule an appointment.