Re: OT: was back pain, now mouse-hand pain

[Per Boysen <perboysen@gmail.com>]

Very important knowledge, Tilman! What you can do as well, if having
to work hard with a computer, is to switch over to a laptop with track
pad every second hour. Then don't click with the right hand's index
finger but with the thumb. What I do as well is to shift fingers and
hands all the time. Juggle over the mouse for the left hand. If that
doesn't feel comfortable for you, just make some lovely caffe latta
and dring it with your right hand while mousing a way with the left.
And move cup far away from keybard! ;-))  After ruing a couple of
keyboards in the past I am today a Master Keyboard Non Destroyer. But
my sons keep pouring milk and stuff into their machines. Seems it
takes a couple of generations for the gene pool to adapt properly...
(ouch, will stop typing this post now since it starts turning into
nonsense....)

Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se
www.perboysen.com



On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 7:08 AM, Tilmann Dehnhard <tilmann@dehnhard.com> 
wrote:
> dear fellow loopers, please be very careful with the computer mouse.
> after mixing a recording using almost only the mouse i had terrible pain 
>in
> the hand and inflammation around the elbow. my right hand got slow and 
>kind
> of numb. i changed to the left hand for a year. took some serious
> conditioning to stop reaching for the mouse with the right hand...
> today i am able to switch hands whenever fatigue and stress build up.
> letting go of the mouse when not in use and simply moving and massaging 
>the
> fingers regularly has helped me, too.
>
> one of the main problems is that the mouse-clicking finger joints do
> experience stress from the operation. unfortunately the movement is too
> small to trigger blood circulation and other recreative measures usually
> maintained by the body.
> this was discovered when a condition surfaced called the "sms-thumb" - a
> terrible stinging pain in the thumb from using cellulars for messaging.
>