Too Much Chatting and Texting Can Lead to Cell Phone Elbow

According to a CBS report, the latest over-use or repetitive motion injury to join the Digital Age list is Cell Phone Elbow: this new type of health hazard is becoming popular with people who spend hours a day chatting on their cell phones.

Physicians are seeing much more Cell Phone Elbow as the number of the devices in use continues to climb. In fact, it's the second-most common compression syndrome the Cleveland Clinic treats, behind Carpel Tunnel, reported CBS.

Cell phones may be to blame for pain or numbness in forearms as well as tingling in pinkie and ring fingers. Doctors say they are seeing more cases of "cell phone elbow" or "cubital tunnel syndrome," according to a study from the Cleveland Clinic.

The reason is how holding a cell phone to the ear causes the elbow to bend, stretching the nerve between muscles and tendons, that's the cubital tunnel. When the arm bent is for long periods of time, the nerve gets inflamed.

Part of the blame for the increase in reported cases is being put on unlimited calling plans which keep users on the phone for longer periods of time.

Symptoms include a loss of muscle strength, coordination and mobility; for example, typing may become difficult, according to a report in Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine. If these symptoms are not treated, the ring and pinky finger can eventually become clawed.

Orthopedic specialists are reporting cases of "cell phone elbow," in which patients damage an essential nerve in their arm by bending their elbows too tightly for too long.

When cell phone users hold the phone to their ears, they stretch a nerve that extends underneath the funny bone and controls the smallest fingers. When talkers chat for a long time in that position, it "chokes the blood supply to the nerves. It makes the nerves short-circuit. The next thing you know, there's tingling in the ring and small finger," said Dr. Peter J. Evans, the director of the Hand and Upper Extremity Center at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio.

To help reverse Cell Phone Elbow, Ashton told CBS to suggest using a hands-free cell phone, rotating the arm you use, or using cell phones less -- she refers to it as "alleviating the offending action."

(June 2, 2009)