Smartphone pinkyand selfie elbow
After a month of constantly ignoring the pain in her lower back, Delhi-based Barsali Bhattacharyya finally saw a doctor when she was unable to perform the simplest of tasks, like picking up a pen from the floor. “I was told that my back muscles had become very weak because of lack of exercise and bad posture. Before that, I’d spend all day working on the laptop in bed,” says Bhattacharyya.
A short while after she began taking care of her back, Bhattacharyya had to head to the doctor’s office again. This time around, it was because of pain in her right wrist. In her 20s, Bhattacharyya spends the better part of her day working on the laptop, but her age or profession have absolutely nothing to do with her developing what is commonly referred to as repetitive strain injury, or RSI.
Similarly, when a young boy in Bengaluru began complaining of acute pain in the neck and shoulders, his parents took him to the city-based musculoskeletal rehabilitation centre, RECOUP. Doctors there found that this boy was often given his father’s iPhone to play games, and he’d “burst bubbles” in a game for hours at a stretch. The child, a fiveyear-old, was diagnosed with RSI, too.
Medical professionals refer to RSI as work-related musculoskeletal disorders, or WRMSD. “This is actually a group of occupational disorders affecting muscles, fascia (connective tissues covering muscles), tendons and neurovascular structures,” says RECOUP’s Deepak Sharan. RECOUP sees over 1,000 patients on an average daily who come in for RSI/WRMSD treatments.
While patients are most commonly between 20 and 40 years of age, Sharan’s research over the years has shown that the most predisposed to this condition include software professionals, performing artistes, sports persons, teachers, bank employees, architects, writers, radio jockeys, dentists, nurses, surgeons, massage therapists, children and home-makers. That’s almost every one of us at risk.
By definition, RSI is the result of actions that you do repeatedly, explains Yash Gulati, an orthopedic surgeon at Apollo Hospital in Delhi. “It could just be typing on the computer or using the mouse; it could be lifting up telephones for work everyday, or even playing your favourite sport. I increasingly see children and teenagers suffering from RSI,” says Gulati.
The symptoms, Sharan says, range from fatigue, sleeplessness, a pain or tingling in your fingers to stiffness, a constant need to stretch or massage one's arms, or even skin discolouration. “RSI has always been a common and widespread condition but it was often misdiagnosed as muscle catch earlier,” says Sharan.
According to Sharan, the commonest areas to be affected include the neck and upper back, followed by lower back and the upper extremities. “In a small fraction, RSI showed itself as a generalised disorder associated with constant pain and numbness,” says Sharan.
Cases related to muscular and nerve injuries have become quite common because of how we spend our time, explains Gulati. After Nintenditis (use of gaming devices) and Tenosynovitis (texting with mobile phones), researches have found that even extensive use of messaging service WhatsApp now deserves a category for itself, WhatsAppitis is soon becoming the old kid on the block. Then there’s ‘Smartphone Pinky,’ where a perceived bend can be detected in the little finger of one’s dominant hand if a person uses the smartphone for more than six hours in a day. The bigger the screen of your phone, the more your little finger has to bend while holding it. And selfie-elbow is fast catching up with tennis-elbow too: it works the same way: bending your elbow to take a selfie.
Vitamin D deficiency, since we don’t get enough sun, also leads to RSI complications. “It is famously said that 70 per cent of Indians suffer from lack of Vitamin D, but I don’t personally believe in that number. However, your muscles are more prone to injury if you don’t get enough Vitamin D. You are also likely to be more tired and that also leads to injuries,” shares Gulati.
“It’s quite clear that these injuries are not related just to work, but also to play,” says Gulati. Nothing beats using ergonomically-designed furniture and equipment, he says. “Earlier, telephone receptionists had to hold up phones all day long, but increasingly everyone uses headsets — that’s an ergonomic solution. We have to find ways to ease the stress on our bodies.”
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