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Computers and Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Studied
pioneer writes "An article on MSNBC.com reports that a Danish study has found that computer use is not a significant risk factor for carpal tunnel syndrome. Not sure about you, but I spent a lot of time learning dvorak and kinesis to prevent just that... the 'inevitable' onslaught of RSI/carpal tunnel/etc."
My opinion is that the younger you started the less likely you are to have problems. I've been at a keyboard since before 10yrs old, and now, over 30, I don't have any problems at all, either eye sight or wrist/hand related. No special keyboards, no left/right hand mouse switching.
M@
Krispy Cream is people
With all due respect to my computer-using brethren, I can entirely understand this and have long suspected the same.
Carpal-Tunnel and RSI were originally diagnosed in women who worked at "sweatshop" textile factories in the early part of the industrial revolution. Sewing is WAY harder on your hands than typing, and so it probably ran rampant in that environment. But there was almost no treatment; women were by and large told to "suck it up" and stop complaining, because it was "just" pain afterall, it's not like they broke anything.
It wasn't until millions of white men started working with keyboards and a VERY SMALL percentage of them got RSI, that it became worthy of national attention. And so now, if you get diagnosed with RSI, you can get disability pay, early retirement, or at least many ergonomic adjustments to facilitate your recovery... IF you're white.
One of the groups who suffer RSI at a much higher rate than computer users: meat packers. Today's meat packing plants run 2-3 times faster, sometimes more, than their historical counterparts, and some cutters have to slice through 60-80 pounds of meat over 100 times an hour. I promise, this will burn out your wrists WAY faster than writing an ActiveX module. But most meat plant workers are Hispanic, and/or non-English speakers. They get $9 an hour, minimal benefits, and, like women in textile factories of old, are usually told to shut up and quit if they don't like it when their wrists are in searing pain.
So, by and large CT/RSI is an affluent white excuse to complain about jobs we aren't "satisfied" with. The people who are truly suffering from these conditions are largely ignored and always have been.
It seems to me that a lot of people complaining about RSI are in crap shape to begin with. Obviously, if you rarely stretch your body and use it in an atheletic capacity, (or if you are an athelete, but you don't properly stretch) it will start catching up to you. In my experience, everyone should stretch as much as one full hour per day, and they should begin with an even more intense regimen to establish good baseline flexibility. It is *amazing* how many aches and pains are due to stiff muscles in your back and legs. For the record, I've never had any RSI, and I've been using computers for an average of 6+ hours a day for twenty years. When I see someone complaining about RSI (which most people in their mid-thirties eventually do in my office), I view them as equivalent to lard-ass, McDonald's eaters that complain about having back pain. Hello?! Do something about your *real* problem (being inflexible (or fat)) before you get some surgery on your hand.