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10 Things That Help Hand Pain
- chelsie462
- 1 day ago
- 7 min read
This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in August 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/SdqG00PCl0Y
Mike: Are your hands feeling stiff, achy, or not just working the way they should?
Brad: Well, we're going to show you our top 10 favorite tips that are going to help your hands feel better, move better, and have a much better day.
Mike: Now, these 10 tips can help if you have a recent hand injury, maybe you had surgery, or perhaps you have arthritis. You can apply one or all 10 to see if they help you.
Brad: Yeah, I think, personally, I've had a little bit of everything, and I've used many of these tips. I have some favorite ones we'll share.
Mike: Tip number one is to actually warm up your hands. Now, if you just acutely injured your hand yesterday and it's swollen, you probably don't want to use heat right now. But once the swelling goes down, or maybe specifically if you have arthritis, heat can really help. Something you can try is just these handheld hand warmers. You can find them online pretty much anywhere nowadays, and they work pretty well.
Brad: Absolutely. You can also simply go to the kitchen and wash some dishes in some warm water. It works well, gets them moving, and you get something done.
Mike: Another option, specifically if it's winter time, they do sell heated gloves now as a good option. I know personally I have some family members who really benefit from wearing those during winter for circulation reasons, as well as stiff finger joints.
Brad: Now, actually this segues right into a contrast bath, which seems a little weird, but what you can do is in the kitchen sink, fill up one sink with cold water, one sink with warm water, and you put your hands in the warm water for one minute, and then you go to the cold water. And actually, some people respond very well to this.
Mike: So, you alternate doing that roughly five minutes. You can go longer than you want, but sometimes just having the nice warm and the cold can help with the blood flow in the area. Circulation just limbers those joints right up. The next option is some type of topical treatment or lotion. There are tons of brands that will work for this. Typically, you want something that either has menthol in it, like what we have with the Holy Cowabunga cream, or you can also use something with capsaicin in it, which is ironically found in peppers.
Brad: Yeah, capsaicin. Yeah, we were just discussing that. Now, the next thing is a mechanical thing. In your house, if you have round doorknobs and you're finding it difficult to grab and rotate without pain, simply get a doorknob that is a lever. And actually, I've done that on the house to enter. I have a lever instead of a round one. And if I got my hands full when I'm taking the groceries in.
Mike: Yeah.
Brad: I can simply lift up with my knee and push that lever and open it up. So, you know, use your knee instead of your hands.
Mike: We'll make a video of that in the future.
Brad: I do not recommend that for people, though, but that's what I do.
Mike: It's a good option. Okay, the fifth option of something can try is to use a splint or a brace of sorts. This might be handy, specifically when you're sleeping. Commonly, when people sleep, their wrist might get flexed, and they might form a knuckle, and then they struggle to open it up in the morning, and it's stiff. Just having some type of brace like this will keep your hand in a nice neutral position when you're sleeping.
Brad: Right. And conversely, you may want to brace your hand when you're doing some work that takes a lot of labor with your hands to support. This tape I'm using is really nice. It's called Coban. It does not stick to your skin. But as you can see, I'm bracing my wrist. It does stick to itself really well, and you can simply pull it like that.
Brad: And there, I have a nice wrist brace. We can go up into the hand or the individual fingers with this product.
Mike: You have numerous color options with this stuff.
Brad: Yeah, it's a six-pack.
Mike: Now, tip number six is to take advantage of electric appliances. We're not talking about a washing machine and stove here. We're talking about things like can openers or even scissors. Getting electronic forms can really take the strain off your hands and joints, relieving pressure and issues you may be having.
Brad: Right? Scissors, that's a real big one on my thumb. It just bothers me. So, if you can just grab, push a button, much easier, and they work really well.
Mike: Now, these last four tips are actually going to be exercises and stretches. You may have some limitations, but just do what you can with them.
Brad: Right, the first one is flexion, or bringing your hands into a fist. Now, you may find that you cannot do a full fist. This is me in the morning when I'm stiff, which I've been doing pretty good in the last year. And actually squeeze that hand together and make a complete fist if tolerated. If you get severe pain with it, don't go so hard. Make sure you do it as tolerated. Be gentle. Take your time.
Brad: And then full extension.
Mike: The opposite direction. So, this is tip number eight. So, opening your hand up. Some people can make a fist, but they can't extend back. Simply go as far as you comfortably can. Take your other hand, if possible, and try to push it open more. With arthritis, you may have it in both hands. But obviously, if you just had an injury to one hand, use your good hand to help out.
Brad: That's right. I call this the mirror stretch because it's like your hand is on a mirror and you just push, and you can stretch both hands and wrists at the same time. That brings us right into the tabletop exercise.
Mike: Tip number nine is going to be a handful of exercises here. I actually watched Bob and Brad's video and did all these for my own hand recovery after I broke it once I had surgery.
Brad: Yep, this works very well. This is the tabletop, just moving the joints right at the big knuckles there.
Brad: Okay, the next one is the claw.
Mike: So, it's not a full closed fist, it's just making a claw like this, like you're doing a bear claw or something. Not the donut, but a claw, open and extending. You can do five to 10 repetitions.
Mike: The next two go together. It's called abduction and adduction. Adduction is bringing all your fingers together. Abduction is fingers apart. You simply open up and close. Do 10 of those.
Brad: That's right. Yeah, five to 10 of all these is typically good. Use good judgment on it. Don't do it for half an hour. A few minutes at the most. Then we can go to the individual joints of each finger, depending on which joint is stiff. Because sometimes, it is just one joint on a finger or a few different fingers, and you simply work each joint individually. Works quite well.
Mike: Now, the last tip is technically called a joint mobilization. We're going to just focus on the wrist here for this one. Brad, do you want to show how to do this?
Brad: Yeah, it works very well. This is a hand I'm going to mobilize. Relax it. Completely relax. If you rest it on the table or a pillow on your lap, and is actually a little better, simply grab with this hand here. Now, can we get a close-up of the wrist? Now, I'm going to pull, and you can actually see if we get close enough that I'm distracting or pulling apart the joint just a little bit. And then watch what happens when I stabilize the hand, but rotate my wrist. Then you get some nice wrist mobilization.
Brad: After you do that, work some circles on that wrist. You can go up and down. Ah, there we go. After this, my hands are feeling much better. Yeah, let's go.
Mike: Now, if you're still having some hand pain or discomfort and want to find some more stretches or exercises, you can check out our video, "Pain Relief For Wrist, Hand & Fingers, 7 Exercises/Treatments."
Brad: There you go. It's us again. So, enjoy the day, and I'm sure you're going to find at least two or three of these helpful for your fingers, hands, and or wrist.
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