How to prevent repetitive strain injuries


Repetitive strain injuries (RSI) are injuries that occur as a result of minor repetitive actions, such as typing and mouse-clicking, whose impact accumulates over time. RSI is painful, and if left untreated can become debilitating, to the point where you struggle to close your hand and grip regular objects.

There are four main factors that place you at risk for repetitive strain injury during computer use:

Poor typing technique.

Poor posture and body alignment.

Tight or weak muscles.

Overuse of the keyboard or mouse.

So far in the article, we saw how you can improve your typing technique and your posture/body alignment, which can help you significantly reduce the risk of suffering from RSI.

With regard to these two factors, another thing that you can do in order to reduce the strain on your hands is to avoid contorting them when you’re typing combinations of keys. For example, combinations such as ‘Ctrl + Z’ and ‘Ctrl + T’ can cause a lot of strain if you type them using the same hand.

As such, if you need to type such key combinations, try to do so by using both hands at the same time. For instance, if you need to input the ‘Ctrl + Z’ combination, try pressing the right ‘Ctrl’ button with your right hand, and the ‘Z’ key with your left hand.

In addition, if you experience pain in a specific part of your hand or in a specific finger, try to avoid moving it too much, to reduce the strain on it. For example, if you have pain in your wrist, try to move your whole arm while typing, instead of the wrist itself.

Furthermore, if you suffer from tight muscles in your hands, there are a few things that you can do in order to reduce the risk of RSI and mitigate its symptoms:

Make sure that your hands are warmed up before you start typing.

Make sure that your work environment isn’t too cold.

Fully relax and rest your hands when you’re not actively using them.

Use breaks in order to stretch your hands properly.

If you are suffering from weak muscles in your hands, you should strengthen your hands and fingers by using therapy putty, stress balls, training bands, hand grippers, finger grippers, or Chinese exercise balls. In a pinch, many of these tools can be improvised using household items, such as a rolled-up pair of socks or a generic rubber band.

You can also benefit from more general types of exercise, such as pull-ups and weightlifting, though these obviously requires more work on your part.

Finally, remember that when it comes to RSI, the most important factor to consider is overuse of the part of your body that is suffering from excessive strain.

You can reduce the amount of strain that you experience from typing by improving your typing technique and your posture, and you can increase your body’s ability to handle that strain by solving any issues that you have with tight or weak muscles. However, at the end of the day, the more you use your hands and fingers in order to type and use the computer, the higher the likelihood that you will suffer from RSI.

Therefore, if you reach a point where you start experiencing RSI, you will likely have to reduce the amount of typing and clicking that you do, by changing the way you use the computer.

For example, you can decide to replace some emails with phone calls where possible. Similarly, you can choose to dedicate more time to planning what you are going to write before you write it, in order to reduce the need for editing later.

In addition, if your hands need rest, you could benefit from using voice-recognition software instead of typing manually. This is especially beneficial if you need time to recover from RSI, but still need to use your computer a lot.

Using voice-recognition software can also be beneficial in general, and some people find it easier to dictate their thoughts to the software while walking around than to type those thoughts by hand. Obviously, this isn’t ideal for everyone, but some people find that it works well for them.

Overall, the topic of RSI is complex, and if you suspect that you are suffering from it or that you are at risk for it, consider reading one of the following in-depth books on how to prevent and treat RSI:

Repetitive Strain Injury: A Computer User’s Guide

It’s Not Carpal Tunnel Syndrome!: RSI Theory and Therapy for Computer Professionals

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