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In my mid 60's I developed arthritis in my hands, hips and knees. I do find oral diclofenac (prescription only) helps when the inflammation is really bad, but the thing that has worked best for me, is to reduce the activities that cause the pain. That means less walking/hiking (I have reduced my weekly walking/hiking from 40 miles to 30 miles) and less guitar playing (This year I will do less than 50 gigs, down from almost 200 gigs a year over the last 20 or so years). It also means that my days of over the road motorcycling is now in the past (my hips cannot take hours of being in one position). I still do short rides on the big two-wheelers.
I can still do all the things I love, just not as much as I used to. It is all a small price to pay for having lived past what life expectancy was the year that I was born.
Fish oil? I might give that a try.
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07-02-2025 10:31 AM
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I've had surgery on both wrists to fix arthritis issues. Right wrist was bolting 3 bones together to make one bigger bone (with a screw inside!) and my left wrist I had a bone removed.
The right wrist was worse than the left; I couldn't turn a door knob or the key in my car for a few years before the surgery. The left had left me unable to play for more an 3 to 5 minutes. I'm happy with the results as I am back to playing again after a few years of missing out on a lot.
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A friend that has hand issues went to just playing shorter scale necks like a 175. I told him to give my Tal Farlow a try and he was amazed by how easy it felt to play.The Tal was strung witrh Benson 12's.There is some magic in that Tal neck and it the one guitar along with my Borys 120 that i can play with more ease when my fingers are stiff or aching.
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The very slim neck of the Yamaha Pacifica 012 is much more comfortable for me. When my hands are hurting, that's the one I play.
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I second RPjazz. My symptoms showed up when playing one of my solid bodies that had a V shaped back of the neck. I don't play thumb over but rather thumb right where that V crests. Thinner necks helped me a lot. I also got relief with a steroid shot 7 years ago, I didn't have to do it again as it never got bad enough. Doctor told me I had a bone spur at the base of the knuckle.
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Timely reappearance of this thread...
Went to an osteopath yesterday, had my hand x-rayed. I have basal thumb arthritis; I have "no cartilage left" in the CMC joint. It's my left hand... I'm right-handed, so it only makes sense that playing guitar all these years was a major contributor ... in my fretting hand thumb. But I also worked in the construction trade for 20 years, so that didn't help either.
Doc said there isn't much to be done, take NSAIDS, wear a thumb brace at night. A cortisone shot if it gets too bad, and an operation beyond that. Avoiding that at all costs.
Arthritis is weird tho... with no cartilage there, you would think it would hurt all the time, but it doesn't. Some days it doesn't bother me at all, most days it only bothers me a little, and occasionally it's worse for a day or three. I take ibuprofen on those days, and it helps. Tylenol helps more, but I can't take Tylenol because I have a fatty liver, and Tylenol is very taxing on the liver.
Interestingly, I have also developed guitarists elbow (AKA tennis elbow) in the same arm. So I have no doubt my left hand technique (gripping too hard probably) has caught up with me after 40 years of playing.
Doc gave me a sheet of a few exercises to do for the thumb, but really it's just management at this point. It can't be improved, but maybe I can slow down the inevitable.
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Okay, playing fifty some odd years, no pain. Spent several months in a recording studio with two guy trying to become "old school" analog recording artists who, admitted they didn't know shit. Very good equipment, LARGE old theatre, very nice old rocker dudes with good intention. After several months trying to get the "sound" just right with mics, playing a cord song pattern over and over, I developed a pain in my left thumbing & now cannot play, period. Hell, I could play three two hour sets: covers, originals, Western Metal!! No pain.
I set my '78 Martin HD-28 to bed, pulled out the ES-339 and seems a bit easier to play but still painful. So, as guitarist singer songwriter, I will NOT give up and want to share some possible cures. There are a number of organic/wildcrafted herbal tinctures from an Oregon company called Herb Pharm. they are meant to ease point pain. I have found some relief using organic cold pressed castor oil applied to the location of the pain, then I apply 99.9% pure phamacutical grade DMSO I get form Canada. DMSO is a carrier and goes deep in the subdurmal skin and into the joint.
At this time, it's finding the "Magical" herbal tincture that will ease the pain and allow me to get back to where I use to be. Hmmm? Kinda sounds like a song there. Anyway, do not give up. Change you diet, stop eating meat, do fermented vegetables and take 99.9% organic sulphur twice a day, don't be a lounge lizard, work out with Tai chi and you WILL see a difference...
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I also have lower back arth. at age 71. In addition to the above, use a classical guitar foot rest. This will help push your back towards the chair back so that you have more support. I find that I tire less easily doing this.
Originally Posted by GuyBoden
For thumb/hand arthritis, try some lineament like Rub-A-535on the back of the hand and around the base of the thumb during the day, but not when playing-gets a bit messy!
Doug
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May be get it diagnosed. Originally Posted by Cholla51
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Some people who can no longer play a conventional guitar or have trouble doing so, have said they play this one in place of it:
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I think if it came to that, I'll try trumpet instead. Originally Posted by Mick-7
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LOL, yeah. I wouldn't go that far, but I guess I would try slide/resonator playing maybe? There's always steel guitar (especially pedal steel, that could take the rest of my life to get good at), but not sure I would do that either. Maybe Native American Flute. Originally Posted by Zack
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Take it from me, as someone who plays trumpet.... it's not an easy choice to make. Originally Posted by Zack
Guitar is much easier to play, until it starts to hurt.
Since I started this thread, I've been focusing more on trumpet, while dialing it back a bit on guitar and experimenting with exercises, guitars, technique.
I didn't have big success until just recently, I started doing more pushups (part of my martial arts training, but that's another topic) and the thumb pain greatly improved. I thought I was on to something as a corrective exercise, since the wrist position is opposite. Short lived success, I got in a couple of good practice days, then it started hurting as much as ever. Go figure.
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Not as medical advice but those of you with arthritis issues should probably see if any of the medications that you are taking are in conflict with each other and cause side effects. Just this past year I have been prescribed high blood pressure medication for the first time. The first one I tried worked fine until I developed a dry cough which is a known side effect. The second one that I tried worked fine until I started taking over the counter red eye drops. It took a couple of months but I developed dizziness when standing up after sitting, a small patch of alopecia on the side of my head, bad hip pain in my right hip, and stomach issues. Sure enough the active ingredient in the eye drops is known for adverse side effects when combined with the high blood pressure medication that I am taking. The eye drops actually reduce blood pressure within eyeballs but eventually get into your entire blood system. In my case the side effect was causing autoimmune issues of which arthritis is one. I stopped using the eye drops and am on the mend now. The side effects have subsided and will hopefully go away entirely. I would say that I am 75% there after about a month of correcting. I don't care how red my eyes look anymore.
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Good advice. There are on-line tools for checking drug interactions. I would hope they're similar to what your pharmacist uses to find interactions. Would be prudent to check it every time you add a medication. Your pharmacist can do it for you at the Consult window. Originally Posted by lammie200
It also makes sense (and seems too simple to bother saying) but your PCP and pharmacist should know everything you're taking for exactly this reason. But it doesn't always happen.
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Well, maybe Jan Hammer's synth "guitar" or a Chapman Stick. Originally Posted by Zack
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I'm a couple years into this journey now. I started losing feeling in a few left fingers so it was time to take some action. It took almost 2 years to navigate the world of referals in our health care system but finally MRI showed what was determined to be severe stenosis in my neck in 4 places. My symptoms were only caused by one of those places. I toughed it out this summer but by the last gig I could barely get through. So last month I bit the bullet and got surgery. I'm 70 now and there are impacts of getting general anesthesia at this age, some of which are impacting me not in a great way. I started PT this week, very stiff and sore as it's not a low impact surgery. But the good news is the numbness in my hands is gone as is the pain in shoulder and arm. Because I'm still recovering it's very difficult to find a comfortable position to play. I can get through 2 or 3 songs max and then it's too painful, it could be I'm done playing out. Mentally I'm working on accepting that I've had 63 years of joy from the guitar and when it's time to stop I hope I can feel gratitude instead of loss. I have some arthritis too as most old folks do, I have 3% diclofenac cream that when rubbed in works well for as much as 4 or 5 days in my case. If you can get some in that strength it might help you keep going.
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Both of my thumbs were diagnosed 17 years ago with arthritis.I tried a totally vegetarian diet for 18 months and it did nothing for me unfortunately except make me miss some foods i love.One thing that has helped is that i stopped drinking coffee and went to green tea.Everyday i get up and make a large pot of green tea.That combined with fish oil pills has made my arthritis much more tolerable along with use of diclofenac sodium topical gel occasionally.Sadly what works for one person may not work for another. Originally Posted by Cholla51
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There is this, although more likely to be true with OTC and supplements than prescription meds. I would recommend seeing a doctor with any of these symptoms to differentiate between osteoarthritis and other problems like autoimmune disorders, septic arthritis, acute inflammatory problems, etc. Treatment and management are very different. A hand therapist might be helpful for some folks. Originally Posted by nyc chaz
Thankfully I don't (yet) have arthritis affecting my hands but I do have it in my neck and spine with osteophytes/bone spurs impinging the nerve roots and some disc degeneration at C5/C6. Having a chat with my doctor next week. My local back and neck pain are much better after some training in the Alexander Technique, I think mainly because I am using my body more intelligently and doing fewer things to aggravate the symptoms. A lot of my back and neck/shoulder pain appear to have been habitual muscle tension, which I have learned to release some of. AT won't fix the underlying joint problems, but improves poor body mechanics that contribute, so that's progress. I feel better than I have in a few years.
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Could you describe the pain in your shoulder and arm? I am having the exact same symptoms... left hand finger numbness, but also with neck pain and shoulder pain, sometimes radiating down the upper arm. I've had an MRI of my cervical (neck) several years ago for neck pain, but was told they didn't see anything other than normal degradation (I am 56). But that was before the numbness & shoulder pain started... Originally Posted by StormyMonday
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Sure. At first I went to the doctor for shoulder pain, as looking up caused pain that went over my left scapula, down the onside of my left arm and then went numb in my thumb and index finger. Doc immediately knew it was neck, so off to a different doctor. MRI showed severe bilateral stenosis C5/6 and C6/7. I also had a previous T1 fracture that worried me, but the C5/6 in particular influence the shoulder/arm/finger nerve. It progressively got worse for 12 months till I also lost neck mobility. If you're having these issues my advice is don't wait too long. Also I wound up with a very good neurosurgeon who was more interested in minimally invasive foraminotomy, whereas Spine surgeons seemed more interested in the much more invasive laminectomy/fusion approach. I wish you the best. I can say that although I'm not able to play yet the pain and numbness seem to be gone. Originally Posted by ruger9
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Also - a bulging disk at C5/6 can cause this shoulder/arm/fingers issue and can be treated with injections, way easier than what I had, MRI will tell you for sure.
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Was your pain unilateral or bilateral? While my neck and shoulder pain is bilateral, the finger numbness is unilateral. Originally Posted by StormyMonday
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For me unilateral even though stenosis is bilateral. So my surgeon opted to fix only what was causing symptoms (C5/6 left side impacts thumb & index finger in left hand). Originally Posted by ruger9
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Thank you for all the info, I'm keeping it in my "medical folder" for possible future use (as I try to get to the bottom of my issues). Originally Posted by StormyMonday
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