[wanderingstan]

> Moving your hand from the keyboard to the mouse and back, is … a large cause of RSI

Citation needed.

When I had RSI the doctor noted that it was only in my non-mouse left hand. They said the moving of my hand between mouse and keyboard provided a relief for my hand, and recommended I move my non-mouse hand away from the keyboard more often.

[BasedAnon]

When I developed bilateral carpal tunnel at 15, my trackpad hand was notably worse and it was greatly aggravated by trackpad use. The difference was so significant that I only bothered having surgery on my trackpad hand (right), I avoided surgery on my left so I keep it as my grabbing hand, since the pain wasn't nearly as bothersome and switching to programmer DVORAK significantly mitigated the pain I was experiencing in the first place.

[ZseeBrz]

Around 10yrs ago I started developing RSI in my right hand, I guess partly because of the mouse scroll wheel, so I started mousing mainly with my left hand, but switched back and forth if that was more comfortable. While it solved the main problem, still didn’t feel as comfortable as I wanted. Now I have the perfect solution: standing desk, mechanical TKL-keyboard, and two trackballs on each side. I wish Logitech made left-handed trackballs, but the left-handed Elecom wireless feels okay and looks similar to the MX Ergo

[cainxinth]

Like many here, I'm sure, I've dealt with computer related RSI for years. I never made the plunge to mouseless, but I have significantly reduced the incidence of pain in my hands and forearms with these tips:

* Get separate mouse and keyboard wrist rests.

* Use more than one type of mousing device and switch up from time to time (e.g. trackball, trackpoint, touchpad, graphic tablet).

* Use a vertical mouse with a handshake-style grip as opposed to standard palm-down mouse, which can put stress on your forearm and elbow.

* Look up RSI forearm stretches and take breaks to stretch your arms and hands for a few moments at least every few hours. I'm also a big fan of gyro ball exercisers.

* An ergonomic chair with movable armrests can keep your arms at around the same height as the desk your working at, which also helps.

* Scroll long pages by clicking the scroll wheel and mousing down rather than using the scroll wheel the traditional way.

[d4rkp4ttern]

I use a MacBook Pro and I developed left shoulder issues. Sounds silly but I am thinking it could be due to heavy use of double keys like Cmd-tab, shift+ for upper casing. I unconsciously avoid typing the colon (:) and write (-) instead where applicable, like in “about this — “ instead of “about this:”, because this feels less painful. Not sure if I am just an example of 1 here

I also think the issue could be the mushy MacBook Pro keys. Not sure how to articulate this, or whether this is a known issue, but these mushy keys over time seem “painful” to use. However my problem with switching to non mushy mech kbs was that I had to always reach for a mouse or trackpad. The convenience (and ergonomics?) of the trackpad under the thumbs is great and normal mech kbs loose that.

So I am now going to try the UHK V2 split keyboard with a trackball module.

[DoingIsLearning]

For carpal tunnel related injuries, alternating positions between mouse and keyboard will provide intermitent relief to the wrist tissues.

For shoulder/rotator cuff related injuries resting your forearm without weight bearing will provide relief, so repeatedly alternating mouse and keyboard will probably cause strain in those tissues.

Unfortunately the term RSI is a huge bag to say some non recovering 'chronic inflammation' which is not particularly helpful in these discussions.