What is Carpal tunnel syndrome?
Carpal tunnel syndrome is the compression of the median nerve in the wrist.
The median nerve is one of the main nerves of the hand. It goes through the wrist at the level of a bony canal formed by the carpal bones. This canal is covered by a ligament called the retinaculum (transverse carpal ligament). In some patients, the median nerve can be compressed in the carpal tunnel, causing numbness in the first three fingers of the hand (thumb, index and middle fingers) and sometimes weakness in some muscles of the hand. These symptoms can be extremely uncomfortable or painful, cause you to wake up at night, and have a significant impact on your quality of life.
Simple, painless surgery can be performed to sever the retinaculum of the carpus to decompress the nerve and improve the symptoms.