Any combination of the following factors can lead to the overuse of some part of your body. Other names for these injuries include Repetitive Stress Injury, Repetitive Motion Syndrome and Occupational Overuse Syndrome. The most common body parts affected by RSI are the fingers, hands, wrists, elbows, arms, shoulders, back and neck. Other areas can be affected as well.
Computer users suffer mostly from repetitive strain injuries to the hand, wrist, and arm.
If your hands are affected, you may find yourself dropping things or it may be difficult to do even simple tasks like buttoning a shirt. These symptoms may appear in any order and at any stage in the development of an injury. Symptoms may not appear immediately after the activity that is causing the problem and are not necessarily experienced in the body part where the actual stress is occurring. For instance, if you wake up in the middle of the night with elbow or shoulder pain, that may be a sign of a repetitive strain injury resulting from keying or mousing at a computer. In general, the more intense the symptoms, the more often you experience symptoms, and the longer symptoms last, the more serious your injury is likely to be.