Ulnar nerve entrapment

You may laugh now but it may very possibly happen to you, especially if you are like me - a major computer/internet user who likes to rest his/her elbow on the armrest/table.

Well, actually from the name 'armrest', it is specially designed for your arm and not your elbow. By resting your elbow on a hard surface for a very long time over a period of time, the nerve on the outside of the elbow will soon become compressed. This leads to ulnar nerve entrapment (wikipedia link). 

A major symptom that I felt is numbness/ feelings of pins and needles/ pain only on the pinky finger and half of the ring finger (you can actually feel as though half of the ring finger is numb... for real.). 

So well, I've done a couple of research into ways to treat/ at least lessen the numbness and I came across this which helps quite a lot - there are a couple of other advice (like wearing an arm splint when I sleep) that didn't help as much and caused extreme muscle cramping which resulted in even more pain lol.

I'd suggest doing the exercise mentioned by the link provided above for at least 10 seconds each for each day until your fingers actually feel better. In addition, try to hang your arms loosely by your side when you are standing instead of bending them.

But most importantly, you must stop whatever that you're doing that causes the ulnar nerve entrapment (for example, like resting your elbow on a hard surface over a long period of time). That doesn't mean you have to stop using the computer all together, it just means that the position of your arm/elbow have to change to reduce compressing the nerve. I had a hard time doing it but I managed it, and so could you! :)

This problem is actually similar to carpal tunnel syndrome, but in carpal tunnel, you are compressing the nerve on your wrist/s. 

Hope this helps!