a - Radial Tunnel

[Guest guest]

Hi a -

You're the only other person I've ever known who has radial tunnel!

When the hand surgeon diagnosed mine, his eyes lit up like a kid at

Christmas. He couldn't wait to get the chance to cut into me, since

he so rarely saw a case of it.

But I wouldn't let him touch me - I don't have a good history with

surgery for nerve problems. For example, I now have a spinal cord

injury instead of just an impinged nerve in my back, thanks to a

simple microdiskectomy! I also found out due to that procedure that

I have a tendency to scar very badly. It just wouldn't be pretty.

I also found out in researching it that the surgery for radial tunnel

is pretty invasive - was that your experience? Nothing like the

little cut they make for carpal tunnel - a big whopping incision

several inches long. And from what I read online, the surgery

doesn't have a very good success rate. I didn't want to risk making

it worse.

So I just live with the pain. Massage helps, and heat/cold, and my

tens unit. I saw a hand specialist occupational therapist, and she

gave me some exercises, but they don't seem to do much good. It's my

right arm, and unfortunately I'm right handed, so I've had to learn

to be ambidexterous. I " mouse " left handed now exclusively, and try

to do more and more with my left. But I still can't write left-

handed, and my job requires a lot of writing (grading papers).

That's probably the worst task I have to do.

I've also exacerbated it by injuring my right wrist somehow. It

swells on the outside back of the wrist, and is extremely painful.

Some steroid shots gave me relief from that for a few months, but

I've somehow reinjured it. Argh. Just one more pain to add to the

list.

Anyway, I wanted to tell you that I sympathize with the pains in your

arm. And if you want to share more about your experience with the

radial nerve and your surgery for it, I'd be very interested in

learning everything I can about it!

Take care...

Cheryl in AZ