Resolved question:
I am a commercial fisherman and I do manual labor every day. ( I am 25 years old). I do a lot of repetitive wrist and elbow movements as well as carrying large lobster 5 ft long pots (60lb+) with my arms out to the sides. Since I have been doing this kind of work, it has been almost impossible to sleep. When I lay in bed, my arms burn and tingle and my hands and arms go numb. Sometimes my arms go numb when I am sitting up but it is worse when I am laying down. Occasionally pain shoots from my hand into my ring finger. I have tried NSAIDs and massage therapy, but nothing seems to work. My symptoms match best with those of tennis elbow, but it seems more severe. The source of the pain seems to be between my humerus and ulna in my elbow, but also in my shoulder and wrist. The only thing that provides some relief is frequent stretching, but I still wake up at night. How can I find out what is wrong and how to fix it?
Submitted:
4 Days
Category:
Orthopedic Surgeon
Hello,
Thank you for your query at DoctorSpring.com
From your symptoms, it seems more like a compressed nerve since there is numbness and burning sensation in your arms.
Can i know for how many years have you been having this symptoms?
It looks from your details that you are doing heavy labour & doing repetitive movements of wrist & hands.
By such heavy labour there are chances of compression of nerves exiting from our arm pit, elbow & at wrist.These nerves supply in hand as wells as at forearm.The increase bulk of muscles & soft tissue may be responsible for this.
If you are not taking rest & continuously under stress then this may also be reason for your problems.
You should consult to a neurophysician or a general physician for this.You may have thoracic outlet syndrome ,cervical spondylosis or nerve compression syndrome.All these can be diagnosed with some investigations & proper clinical examination.Till then you should do following-
-Take good sleep,at let for 6-8 hrs.
-Avoid lifting excess of weight.
-Take a good analgesic.I used to prescribe combination of tramadol with paracetamol in such cases.
-Take a nerve supplement like vitamin B complex.
Hope this all will help you.
With best wishes.
Regards.