[hschenker]

> I'm now trying to retrain my hands to keep the mouse closer. I find that I naturally end up keeping the mouse in about the same place as always, far to the right of the keyboard.

Ha ha. Irony of ironies. Keeping your hand farther away from your body is actually good because it guards against cubital tunnel syndrome: http://www.eatonhand.com/hw/hw007.htm

[tomlu709]

You misunderstand. The cubital tunnel article suggests you increase the space between your body and your work (move further away from the desk). This is to decrease the amount of bend in the elbow joint. Moving the mouse closer to the keyboard decreases the distance between your elbow and your body, which helps relieve your trapezius and deltoid muscles, but does not affect elbow angle.

Hope that helps.

[hschenker]

It could be that my estimation of other people's elbow angles are incorrect. When I place my hand above the numeric keypad, my elbow angle is about 100 degrees. When I move it about 10 inches to the right, it increases to about 120 degrees.

This might be because of my typical seated posture - I lean quite far back in my chair.

If, however, I slouch forward towards my monitor, with my shoulders off the back of the chair, the increase in elbow angle when moving my hand 10 inches to the right is much smaller.