hey everybody it's Doctor Jo and precious Kali. and today I'm going to show you
seven stretches and exercises for the thumb joint or the CMC. so let's get started.
so before we get started, if you haven't already, make sure and click on
the subscribe button, especially if you have a question or a comment. otherwise I
might not see it, and if I don't see it how do I respond to it?
okay so the CMC joint of the thumb, or the carpometacarpal joint is way down
here. It's that joint the basically comes into the wrist, and it's a spot that gets
a lot of arthritis. if you have hand arthritis, you probably have arthritis
here in that CMC joint. so just getting it moving, kind of stretching it
out, is a great way to help kind of relieve some of that pain in there. so
the first one is super easy. all you're gonna do is basically open and close
your hand. so you're gonna when you close your hand, you're gonna actually close in
on your thumb. so kind of coming in giving a little stretch and then opening
everything back up. so coming down stretch into that thumb, and then come
back out. so with these, depending on how sore your thumb is, you can just start
off with five or ten reps. maybe do two sets at a time a couple times a day just
to kind of get everything nice and loosened up. so that one's a pretty easy
one to start off with. the next one is crossing your thumb over almost to the
joint of where your pinkie is. and so trying to keep everything out straight
out, you're coming over and across. and so if you have some arthritis in that joint,
you might not be able to get all the way across like that, and that's fine. you
know if you can just get to here work, on that again maybe just five or ten reps
doing a couple sets, and hopefully the more you do, you'll be able to get all
the way over to that other side. but it shouldn't be painful. you should just
feel tension and pressure or a stretch, but it shouldn't be painful. don't force
going all the way over that way. so then the next one is just going away from the
other fingers. so this time you're bringing your thumb up and then coming
back down, collapsing in. so again pretty easy to do.
if you've got some pretty severe arthritis in there, that might be
uncomfortable. so again just go the motion that's comfortable for you, where
you're getting a stretch, where you're getting some tension, but it's not
painful. and then you're gonna just go in the opposite direction. so now you're
bringing your thumb up and coming back down. so kind of going almost like you're
bringing your thumb up towards the ceiling. and again just that pain-free
motion. five or ten reps, doing a couple sets
couple times throughout the day getting that nice motion in there. so then the
next one is just going to be taking your thumb and tapping it to each finger. so
almost just closing a loop and going back and forth, really opening back up
each time you touch the fingers. so really just alternating. you can go up
and down, doing a couple sets of those, but really make sure you're opening back
up that hand as you come back to get that stretch in there. you can do a
little push, get a little bit of strengthening in there as well, as long
as that's comfortable as you're doing it. so just that nice push, open and closing.
so after you do that, then a little bit more strengthening. this time you're
gonna use both fingers. kind of make a chain link in between the two keeping
the fingers tight you're gonna pull apart. so if they weren't together this
is what I was doing, but now I'm just pulling apart like this, getting that
strengthening in there. so maybe it's just like a three to five second pull.
this is just almost like an isometric exercise, so I wouldn't pull as hard as
you can the first time. you'll probably feel it in that joint area. so again just
feeling tension or pressure but not pain. so three to five second hold maybe do
five at a time two or three sets a couple times throughout the day. and then
the last one is to start getting some more movement in the other joints. so
this is the joint down here, that CMC joint, but these are often affected as
well. so the last one is really kind of stabilizing this part here. so you can
just grab that kind of meaty part of your thumb, and just hold it there to
stabilize it. so now I can get some good movement in that top two joints right
there. so now I'm just kind of curving that thumb
in, but see I'm not getting that movement there I'm holding it, and I'm getting
those top joints moving there. so this one again you can do like a continuous
movement, or if you want to go there and maybe hold it for five to ten seconds,
you can do that. but I really like kind of doing a continuous movement maybe
again doing like 10 of those, couple sets, a couple times throughout the day. there
you go. did that fix your thumb? it did? so there
you have it. those are my seven stretches and exercises for the thumb joint, or the
CMC. if you'd like to help support my channel, make sure and click on the link
up there. and don't forget to subscribe where?
down there. and remember, be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon.