Care for Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and Nerve Injuries

Our hand specialists will get you on the road to recovery

Nerves are your electrical wiring system, carrying messages from your brain to different parts of your body. Like an electrical cable protected by insulation, nerves in your hands and wrists are protected by a ring of tissue. When these nerves and tissue are pinched, pressured or cut, messages to and from the brain are interrupted, and the muscles in your hand may not work properly.

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

There is a space in the wrist called the carpal tunnel where a nerve and tendons pass from the forearm into the hand. When swelling in this space puts pressure on the nerve, it is called carpal tunnel syndrome. It causes numbness, tingling, pain and loss of function in the hand and fingers.

It is one of the best-known "repetitive-stress" injuries, resulting from repeating the same action over a long period of time—typing, texting, knitting, using hand-held power tools and other activities. Sometimes it results from injuries, arthritis, fluid retention during pregnancy, diabetes and other conditions.

Our hand surgeons diagnose this condition by getting a detailed history from you. This includes learning any other medical conditions you may have, understanding how you use your hands, and performing an X-ray and, in some cases, other tests to see your nerves more closely.

To relieve the pain and tingling, our physicians often relieve your symptoms without surgery. They do this by identifying and treating other medical conditions, changing the patterns of hand use, keeping your wrist in a splint or prescribing medication. When symptoms are too severe or do not improve with these other treatments, surgery can be done to make more room for the nerve.

Other Nerve Compression Conditions and Injuries

There are other nerve compression conditions similar to carpal tunnel syndrome:

• Cubital tunnel syndrome occurs when the ulnar nerve, which passes behind the elbow and down to the hand, is squeezed. This causes a tingling sensation. Treatment usually begins with splinting of the elbow and medication. Occasionally surgery is necessary to release or move the nerve.
• Radial nerve compression, also called resistant tennis elbow, occurs when the nerve that operates several muscles around the wrist and hand is compressed, or pinched. Our hand specialists can treat this with or without surgery.

When nerves and their surrounding tissue are cut in traumatic injuries, both the nerve and its insulating tissue are broken. If the nerve is not fixed, new nerves will grow into a ball at the end of the cut, forming a nerve scar that can be painful. Our surgeons reattach the nerves and the tissue surgically so the nerve may grow normally. This usually restores the function in your hand. Sometimes this surgery includes a graft—taking a piece of nerve from another part of the body and using it to fix the injured part.

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