Repetitive Strain Injury

Also known as Work Related Upper Limb Disorders (WRULD) and Occupational Overuse Syndrome (OOS)

As keyboard use is becoming more and more prevalent in the work and home environment the incidence of these types of conditions is still high.

The initial epidemics of the eighties have been controlled by the design of both equipment and task but there are still a significant number of new cases due to the high pressure environments in the work place, sedentary job design and the fact that people are easily affected by gravity and habitual postures.

The good thing is that early recognition of the problem by the computer user and health professional is now commonplace. This means that treatment can start earlier and the control of symptoms can be more easily attained.

Over time we have begun to understand these conditions better but the initial understanding by the medical community was that the syndromes were marked by "symptoms" without "signs". In other words the early descriptions of the problems suggested that there were no medical tests that could prove the problem or disprove its presence.

Physiotherapists have described the condition as being neural in quality but as the medical tests that usually look at neural problems are better for more significant problems of the nervous system. Conditions that affect nerve conduction, such as a spinal disc prolapse, blatantly squashing a nerve, are more easily tested by nerve conduction studies or can be seen on imaging. RSI that involves more minor pressures or inflammation of the nervous system are not so easily tested. Research recently completed at UCL in London suggests that vibration studies of the nerves are more accurate in the diagnosis of these problems.

One common factor in the treatment of RSI's is the multi-disciplinary methods required for the condition to start to improve. This is more to do with the type of problems that RSI sufferers present with and the natural history of the recovery than anything else.

Postural correction and exercise are very important but so too are the symptom relieving techniques we employ. Physioworks are skilled inthe treatment of RSI type syndromes. Be sure to also read the posture sections on this site, as postural correction is one of the major tools in the treatment of RSI.