6 weeks post op

That's a pretty hard one to answer online I think. I guess the only general guideline is not to push it so hard that it causes persistent pain. I would also advise not being in too much of a rush to regain full grip strength after surgery. Most post-op studies have followed people up within 6 months of surgery and tend to show mild loss of grip strength (about 2% or so on average) after surgery, but many surgeons seem to think that this can be expected to improve in the long-term. When I find the time to search my literature database for some hard evidence this would be a good topic to add to the website but I'm a little busy with other things at present. JB

Now 7 weeks on, the scar is healing nicely. My hand is definitely getting stronger although I do get some pain if I accidentally knock the scar. Unfortunately my right hand which I had injected has taken a turn for the worse. I can still play tennis but I feel that I am losing strength in the wrist and getting numbness in the middle finger and an ache in my thumb especially since the injection seems to be wearing off. Wearing my splint helps to relieve symptoms although my hand is not keeping me awake at night. I don't know whether to start the process rolling to have an op or not. I keep thinking it will improve but realistically I know that it is getting worse. I have been asked if I have neck problems, I have said no but I do get aches how could this affect my CTS.

Sounds as though you might be heading for surgery in the other hand. Injections can be repeated, and having had one treatment on each side you are now in a perfect position to decide for yourself on the further management of the right hand as you know exactly what to expect from each. We will be publishing a paper on second injections shortly I hope.

Regarding the neck, there is a page of this site devoted to double crush syndrome which discusses the issues - about which there is a good deal of uncertainty - sorry! JB

Its 4 am. and just had to put on splint for right hand. This is the first time I have been woken by it since the injection so I guess it is getting worse. I see that you can arrange surgery when Canterbury patients decide to go for it. I don't know how long your waiting lists are but the thought of waiting months for our health service in Wales to come through with an appointment is daunting having gone through the nights of discomfort with the left hand. I rang to find what the waiting time was for my left hand and was told September or October 2012 and then out of the blue was given a Saturday appointment on June 23rd which I assume was a waiting list initiative. I have been putting off the thought of a second surgery but I am going to have the op. as soon as I can. I hope it will be as successful as my left hand surgery appears to be.

I think you had it injected on 21st March so it looks as though that lasted about 4-5 months which is not unusual. If you are faced with a long wait for surgery just get it re-injected as a holding measure while on the waiting list (though I appreciate that you had to get it injected privately last time - really this is something that should be readily available on the NHS anywhere but I don't decide these things). I can get uncomplicated cases operated here in East Kent in about 4-10 weeks - the lag time varies a bit from time to time depending on surgeons holidays and fluctuations in demand. Ideally we would like to keep it at about 4 weeks or so which seems to me to be a reasonable period for elective surgery. You need to give people time to arrange their own schedules to accommodate surgery and surgery is a relatively expensive resource that you do not want to waste by having empty operating lists so you have to strike a balance between always having a small pool of people needing the operation to fill the lists and not having too long a wait - a tricky balancing act sometimes. Of course if we started taking imported patients from outside our area the queue would rise :-( JB