Is all that gaming leaving you with painful wrists or fingers?

As technology continues to advance, so does the repetitive usage of our hands and fingers. From furiously typing away at our keyboards to tapping our thumbs on smartphones, it's easy to see how symptoms of arthritis may be linked to new-age devices. But does all this typing equate to potential inflammatory traits?

Video games

The number of people who devote hours to playing video games has never been higher. According to the Entertainment Software Association, 59 percent of Americans currently play video games, with an average of at least two people who frequently engage in video games in each U.S. game-playing household. So what's the correlation with arthritis?

Researchers from the New York University School of Medicine analyzed whether extensive video game usage had any painful effects on children by rounding up 171 kids who regularly played video games. With one-third of the subjects reporting that they played one to two hours of video games daily, the questionnaire-driven study found that 12 percent of the children claimed they had regular finger pains, and nearly 10 percent reported wrist pain. The average age of the kids was less than 10 years old.

Dr. Yusuf Yazici, a professor of the department of rheumatology at New York University and contributor to the study, expressed how the results indicated that many unreported symptoms of pain in children can probably be associated with excessive video game play.

"Our study suggests that a significant portion of children playing with game consoles experience hand and wrist pain, which may not be recognized," Yazici said in a statement. "Our data suggesting young children experiencing more pain is also concerning and maybe some guidance as to when young children should start playing with such game consoles needs to be considered."

The pain they found is not arthritis. But it may suggest that the wear and tear on joints from heavy video game use could set the stage for arthritis to develop later.

Texting

As texting becomes a primary source of communication in today's society, our thumbs are getting more of a workout than ever before. According to Pew Internet, the average teenager is sending out 60 text messages a day, equating to an astonishing figure of nearly 22,000 texts a year. While the action of sliding your thumbs against your phone seems subtle, researchers from Rush University Medical Center in Chicago report that forceful pinching motions performed by our thumbs over extended periods of time may lead to more severe symptoms in the carpometacarpal joint, which is where the thumb connects to the wrist. While further research needs to be executed to truly determine a solid connection between texting and arthritis, it's obvious that constantly striking your phone keyboard probably isn't doing your thumbs any favors.

Preventative actions

Although it isn't official that texting your thumbs off or flicking your video game controllers may produce symptoms of arthritis, it's easy to start implementing precautionary methods to your everyday life that might alleviate any stiffness of joints. Simple hand exercises are easy and can be performed whenever you're taking a break from the console or your phone. The Mayo Clinic features several hand stretches that may help those wishing to ward off any progression of arthritis.

To learn more about living with arthritis:

Hand Exercises for Musicians with Arthritis