Very bad wrist pain...

[asking79]

I broke my scaphoid about 3-4 years ago and I had a tremendous amount of pain with that but it eventually went away, but I still occasionally had some pain that might last a minute or so but very rarely.  Now last week my wrist has started hurting again really bad and it won't go away.  It was fine one day and then the next morning I woke up in severe pain. Sometimes the pain is going all the way up into my elbow and my arm from wrist to elbow hurts, sometimes it just shoots up to my elbow, but most of the time it is just in my wrist and it hurts really bad regardless of what I'm doing.  I can be laying in bed to go to sleep and it hurts or trying to do something that requires use of my hand.  Strange thing is when I went to pick up something heavy the pain actually went away until I put what I was holding down.  Does anyone have any ideas on what this pain could be caused by or how to make it go away?  It's really annoying.  Thanks in advance.

[asking79]

Well, it went away for about a week and came back 2 days ago.  It's actually on the opposite side of my wrist from the scaphoid and it's the side I fell on when I broke my scaphoid.  They did all kinds of xrays but didn't see anything but the broken scaphoid.

[Dr. Kokil Mathur]

Hi!
Since you had scaphoid fracture, there is a possibiltiy that you have a pinched nerve that causes pain in certain wrist positions.
Your symptoms could be due to carpal tunnel syndrome. In this the median nerve is compressed at the wrist in a place called the carpel tunnel. Symptoms begin with numbness and tingling of the first three or two fingers from the thumb side. Nerve conduction studies are quite diagnostic. Treatment is usually by splints and steroid injections. Surgery may be required in some cases. This condition is common in those who use the key board, mouse etc a lot—like in computers or in typing jobs.
Other possibilities are rheumatoid arthritis, gout and an injury (recent) which you do not remember. Do discuss this with your doctor and get yourself examined as a confirmed diagnosis is not possible on net. You may need X-ray, MRI, nerve conduction studies etc for diagnosis. Take care!