Scott on Writing

Musings on technical writing...

The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again!

On July 15th I broke my right hand playing basketball, which resulted in a cast that severely limited the mobility and dexterity of my right hand and fingers. Today the cast came off! I am back to having all ten fingers available for typing, writing, eating, dressing, and piano playing! Granted, things aren't back to 100% yet. My wrist and hand muscles are extremely weak right now, but that will strengthen over time. For now I can painlessly use the mouse and type. I get some muscle twinges when playing the piano or gripping small objects (like a pen or pencil). And the doctor said no basketball for at least another month.

After asking for suggestions on how to function at work on a day-to-day basis with one hand, many people chimed in with advice - thank you! Being reduced to typing and programming with one hand is no fun. At first it is extremely limiting and very frustrating. However, over time and with enough practice I was able to significantly increase my words/minute typing speed using my left hand and a lone finger on my right hand. Immediately after my injury I was typing around 30 wpm, but by the time the cast came off I was north of 50 wpm.

The best suggestion I received was to use voice recognition software. I ended up buying a copy of Dragon Naturally Speaking and used it for writing the majority of my emails and articles. It was not very useful when programming, although I did use it every now and then in SQL Server Management Studio to write ad-hoc SQL statements. As my typing speed improved I found myself using Dragon Naturally Speaking less and less. Now that I have full faculty of my right hand I doubt I will use DNS again (unless, heaven forbid, I have another hand injury at some point in the future). While voice dictation is nice, it cannot compete with my typing speed. Also, the error rate on voice dictation is still too high, in my opinion. In my experiences I'd get an error in dictation once or twice per paragraph. While that's not a lot, it does require going back and making the correction from the keyboard most times, and that is time consuming. What's more, I find that when speaking I have to collect my thoughts and decide what, exactly, I'm going to say before speaking it. With typing, however, I just start moving my fingers and the words come to me as I'm clicking and clacking away.

Thanks again to everyone who offered suggestions or shared their stories.

posted on Monday, August 18, 2008 5:25 PM

Feedback

# re: The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again! 8/19/2008 6:25 PM Paúl R.

Scott, be careful, your hands are now extremely vulnerable - and you are joyfully returning to the two activities which are known for causing neuromuscular disorders and aggravating their mutual symptoms.
Be careful.
P.S. I tried submitting this comment two times before; it didn't show up nor let me know whether it was admitted... And a figure in the code is hard to identify: it could be either "9" or "g".

# re: The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again! 8/20/2008 3:33 PM Scott Mitchell

Paul, thanks for your concern. The doctor said that I could get back to typing and playing the piano and writing without delay. However, he did say that I need to hold off at least a month before I get back out on the basketball court.

# re: The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again! 8/23/2008 12:16 PM Amin

Scott, what you really think about getting back to basketball?! I broke my ankle in soccer one day after you and now I'm hesitating to think about playing again! ;)
that's a weird condition! obviously (and hopefully) it'll change...

# re: The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again! 8/25/2008 5:18 AM PradeepTP

Great to hear that good news.

I have a suggestion for your site 4guysfromrolla.com. Don't you think it is high time to change the look and feel of that site. The site is really good with its articles and other, but it will get a new energy if you can do a dress change :).

Be careful with your hands next time!

cheers!!

# re: The Cast is Off! I've Got Two Functional Hands Again! 8/25/2008 9:38 AM Scott Mitchell

Amin, I can't wait to get back to basketball. My hand muscles are still weak and I'm out of shape from limited cardio while the cast was on. But once my hand muscles get back up to par, I'd like to get back out on the court and work my endurance back up. The elliptical machine or treadmill is no substitute for the workout you get playing ball.

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