Hand pain can affect so many aspects of your life, from work to play. When you feel pain in your hand, wrist and elbows, you can’t use a keyboard or hand tools, not to mention being unable to exercise or play sports. At TOPS Surgical Specialty Hospital, our Houston orthopedic hand surgery specialists understand the value of healthy hands, wrists and elbows. Our orthopedic surgeons who specialize in hand conditions have helped thousands of patients by relieving hand pain and restoring functionality through noninvasive and surgical methods.
If you’re thinking you may need hand surgery, here are a few questions you will be asked:
Here are just some of the conditions that our orthopedic hand, wrist and upper extremity specialists treat.
Arthritis is a painful condition that’s caused when the protective cartilage around your joints break down further causing inflammation and making you feel stiffness and pain.
A bicep tendon injury could be a mild as tendonitis or a full tear of one or both of the biceps muscle’s two tendons that attach it either to the shoulder bone or to the elbow’s radius bone. Since we use our biceps muscle to move our forearm or to bend the elbow, a bicep tendon injury can be both painful and keep us from participating in athletics or working with our arms on the job.
Carpal tunnel syndrome is especially common today since most professionals work on keyboards to get work done. As we use our hands, we exert pressure on the median nerve which runs from the forearm through the carpal tunnel, a type of passageway in your wrist. Since the median nerve controls the sensation you feel to all of your fingers and thumb on the palm side (except the little finger) among other functions, it can become compressed, causing your hand to become numb, weak and you to feel a tingling sensation.
Cubital tunnel syndrome is different from carpal tunnel syndrome which affects the hand. While both are compression injuries, cubital tunnel syndrome affects the ulnar nerve which is located near the elbow and sometimes referred to as our “funny bone.” The ulnar nerve can become compressed when it’s irritated or stretched by muscles, tendons or bone causing the hand to become numb and tingle.
Some babies may be born with congenital hand abnormalities or differences which may be caused by genetics or some other reason that we don’t know. These deformities can present the child with challenges and disabilities as the child grows and learns how to use their hands. These conditions include unequal or uneven fingers, deformity in their thumb or a missing or absent bone in the hand. Treatments can include reconstructive surgery or prosthetic devices that can help the child gain function in the hand.
DeQuervain’s tenosynovitis, also called stenosing tenosynovitis, occurs when tendons around the base of the thumb are irritated or constricted. This is typically caused by overuse especially from activities that require forceful gripping while flexing and extending the wrist. If you have de Quervain’s tenosynovitis, it will probably hurt when you turn your wrist, grasp anything or make a fist–especially while playing sports like tennis, pickleball or golf or working with hand tools that require a tight grip. Symptoms include:
A dislocation occurs when the ends of two connected bones are separated and no longer in their proper position.
Dupuytren’s contracture is a hand condition where the palm of your hand at the base of your fingers thicken causing a hard lump. It can cause your fingers to curl inwards, towards the palm, and prevent you from straightening them. The ring and little fingers are the two most commonly affected digits, but it can affect both hands and, sometimes your feet. Research has indicated that it could be linked to lifestyle habits such as smoking cigarettes, alcohol addiction and diet deficiencies, but has also been linked to diabetes and some anti-seizure medication.
Symptoms include:
Our orthopedic hand surgeons can perform any of a number of procedures, depending on your condition.
The most common type of hand surgical procedure is closed reduction and fixation surgery. Our orthopedic surgeons look to correct the alignment of a broken or displaced bone or joint. The aligned bone is then held in place by internal fixtures such as rods, wires, or splints.
Nerve injuries in the hand can lead to a loss of muscle function. A surgeon can correct this with nerve repair surgery. This surgery reconnects the severed nerve in the hands. However, if the nerve is too damaged, our surgeons may perform nerve graft surgery. In this procedure, we take a healthy nerve from another part of the body and replace the completely damaged nerve.
Nerve repair surgery can restore hand function for many patients.
For amputated fingers or injured hands, we perform skin grafts. Skin grafts revive the skin where it’s needed. We take up skin tissue from other, healthy areas of the body and graft it at the site where it’s needed. This helps restore the physical appearance of your hands.
Tendons are the delicate fibers that join your muscles to your bones. When you experience tendon rupture, we can remove the damaged tendons and replace them with healthy and intact tendons from other parts of the body.
Arthroplasty, or joint replacement, is performed to treat a case of severe arthritis in the hands. The damaged hand joint is removed during surgery and replaced by a prosthetic joint. This restores hand mobility and relieves pain.
Fasciotomy is meant to reduce pressure and swelling in the hand. Excessive swelling due to an injury or infection can affect blood flow to your hand. In a fasciotomy procedure, our surgeons make an incision to reduce this pressure, restore blood flow to the hand, and correct compartment syndrome.
If you are looking for an orthopedic surgeon to help you with hand pain, TOPS Surgical Specialty Hospital has a number of doctors who can help. We’ve listed them below so that you can find one who is right for you.
At TOPS Surgical Specialty Hospital, our team of professional, empathetic healthcare professionals works to give you an accurate diagnosis and the treatments you need to get well. Our advanced technology allows physicians to gather more accurate data to help them diagnose and treat conditions of the hand.
You can learn more about our advanced facility by contacting us. You can also find a list of doctors below who can help you with orthopedic hand conditions.
