Anyone deal with carpal/cubital tunnel or thoracic outlet?

Do you use a mouse a lot? “Mouse shoulder” can be a real contributor due to the forward internal rotation.

You can 100% fix some of the potential causes, but it can be a lot of work.

For the forearm itself, I really like the product called the “Armaid” - I fixed a CT diagnosis with this.

The nerves running through the traps also can be a contributor, I used a softish mobility ball in a doorway to fix mine.

Some of Kelly Starrets early mobilityWOD videos had really good banded distractions for the front of the shoulder.

The book “The Frozen Shoulder Workbook” is an incredible resource.

If you’re interested I can try to find some videos of my favorite stuff.

Absolutely!

So in my elbow they actually moved the nerve under some fascia. It gets it out of that small space it's naturally in. A couple of years after I had that done I had a dog jerk my arm really hard and it messed it up enough that they had to go back in and put the nerve under the muscle.

For the TOS it got diagnosed after a pt working on me suggested my symptoms could actually be from TOS. After that you have to go through all the motions of tests and such. You usually start with physical therapy. Mine had been going on so long and with previous rounds of surgeries and physical therapy they decided to do surgery. My surgery involved removing my first rib completely and then freeing up the brachial plexus and getting all the scarring off.

It was a really tough surgery and recovery, but it was finally the thing that relieved my symptoms. I have the pain come and go, but nothing compared to what I was living with for so many years.

Sorry for the super long response!

So I saw a doctor in Salt Lake that did the surgery robotically. He's a professor at U of U that teaches how to do robot surgery in the cardio-thoracic region. If you've seen Dr. Pearl for the TOS though I wouldn't bother seeing anyone else. He is the best!

It's totally possible that you have all 3 areas being compressed like I did. I am hopeful for you that it isn't TOS and that you don't need the big surgery. If you do end up needing it the odds are really good that it will help relieve your symptoms though!

I think you would get some relief, but if it's compressed at the neck and shoulder as well you're still going to have problems.

My biggest problem was the constant, deep pain from the neck all the way into my fingers. Excruciating honestly. I had lost a lot of strength and coordination with it as well. My hand was curling up. Like my ring and pinky fingers still curl up towards my palm.

The problem with NTOS is that with the nerve conduction tests it doesn't always show compression from that area. It's just so hard to definitively diagnose NTOS.

Yeah is it your dominant hand as well? The pain is what wore me down. You can only go so long with that pain before it takes over your life. At least that's how it was for me. So sorry you're having to deal with this.

I would probably do the surgery at the elbow and hand and give it some time to see how that goes. If it's only slightly helpful and you're still having issues I'd really push for checking on TOS and start things for that specifically.

Same here. Bad enough to have these symptoms and then it also be the hand you use for everything lol.

So from the time I first started having symptoms to being diagnosed with TOS was about 9 years. Everything presented as cubital tunnel throughout the years. It wasn't until after still having issues they did a nerve test and everything looked good from the previous surgeries but they tested above my elbow on the inside of my upper arm and it was showing funky things.

If we hadn't done that we'd still probably think it was cubital. I never actually had any symptoms of carpal.