Carpal tunnel syndrome is a nerve disorder of the hand, caused by compression of the median nerve. A. Rashard Dacus, MD, explains the symptoms, causes and treatments of this common disorder.

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Carpal tunnel syndrome is probably one of the most common things we see in hand surgery. And to be honest, one of the most common things that's out there in America. It's basically a compression of a nerve in the wrist and that nerve is called the median nerve. And so it runs in the middle of the hand and it gives innervation to the thumb index and the long finger. So when you have pressure on that nerve people get symptoms such as numbness and tingling. At night times, waking-ness. Numbness when they drive. Feeling of achiness and sometimes shooting pains into the fingers.

Risk factors for carpal tunnel syndrome tend to revolve around things that are more systemic in nature. So things like diabetes, inflammatory stuff like rheumatoid arthritis can give people propensity for it. Vibratory activities such as using a jack hammer or a chainsaw. If you're doing repetitive activities with the wrist. Typing isn't directly correlated with it but we do see a percentage of people who do have worsening symptoms with typing. There are some times that people will get it from trauma. So if you were to have a fall and break your wrist, you can get numbness in carpal tunnel.

So in general, we recommend that people see a physician for hand numbness when that numbness has become consistent. So one to two days of hand numbness isn't particularly that concerning, but when it becomes weeks to months, we're definitely concerned. We also recommend if it's getting worse, if you're having nighttime symptoms that really get in the way of your ability to perform your daily activities. Or if it's limiting your ability to be able to grip and hold things in a manner which you feel comfortable. Those are things in particular we recommend going to see a physician for.

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