De Quervain Syndrome is a painful condition affecting the tendons on the thumb side of your wrist. It occurs when the tendons that control thumb movement become inflamed, causing discomfort during activities like gripping, lifting, or twisting your wrist. Often referred to as De Quervain’s tenosynovitis, this condition can significantly impact your daily hand function, limiting motion and causing swelling along the thumb and wrist.
Orthopaedic surgeons commonly see this condition in patients who experience painful tendons in the wrist, hand thumb pain, or swelling in wrist and hand. Proper hand treatment and patient education are essential to prevent further complications.
Repetitive thumb and wrist motion
Overuse of hand and wrist tendons
Lifting infants (De Quervain new mothers)
Hormonal changes affecting tendons
Direct wrist and hand tendon injury
Inflammation of tendons in hand
Certain hand conditions (tunnel in hand)
Strain from typing, texting, or gripping
Pain along thumb side of wrist
Weak or stiff tendons in your thumb
Being a new mother lifting infants
Jobs with repetitive hand and wrist motion
Age 30–50 (tendons weaken)
Pre-existing hand inflammation causes
History of wrist and fingers injuries
Strain from elbow to wrist
Hormonal changes (cortisone syndrome)
Activities stressing thumb and wrist
Chronic hand and thumb pain
Prior tendon in hand disease
Pain at thumb side of wrist
Swelling in wrist and hand
Pain moving thumb or straightening fingers
Tender tendons in your thumb and wrist
Difficulty gripping (your hand with pain)
Hand and thumb pain into wrist or elbow
Painful tendon in hand on motion
Catching or snapping in thumb motion
Warmth or redness along side of wrist
Limited wrist and thumb mobility
Treatments range from conservative treatment to surgery. Our goal is to provide you with the best treatment plan to reduce pain, but these treatments do not change the underlying source of pain. Medical treatments are often used in combination such as: medications, physical therapy programs, and injection therapy.
Treats radiating pain; deposit the medication, typically steroids in the epidural space of the spine.
Targets a specific spinal nerve and deposit medication around the nerve at the point where it exits the intervertebral foramen (bony opening between adjacent vertebrae).
Treat pain stemming from a specific facet joint.
Deposit medication around the medial branches of spinal nerves. The medial branch is a nerve that sends pain signals to the brain from an arthritic facet joint. An injection directed around the medial branch can relieve neck and lower back pain.
Treats pain by lesioning medial branch nerves of the facet joints.
