Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Whatsappitis: An inflammatory chat

It's finally official.
Whatsapp, the most popular social interacting messaging system has carved a niche for itself. It has been honored by the renowned medical journal, Lancet, by dedicating an illness to this chat service. 

Whatsappitis is what it has been called. 
A 34 yr old doc developed severe pain in both her wrists
on Christmas Eve due to constant messaging with both her thumbs on Whatsapp for a period of 6 hrs. The diagnosis was bilateral extensor pollicis longus tendinitis of the thumb. She was treated with analgesics and advised rest to the wrists which she failed to follow since she was again on duty on New Year's Eve and whatsapping again. 

In 1990, Nintendinitis, a similar term was coined for video games related strain injuries. 

Heavy cellphone users have earlier been found to suffer from ringxietyPhantom ringing or Phantom vibration syndrome, a phenomenon in which users imagine their phone ringing or feel it vibrate when it actually doesn't. 

Tenosynovitis caused by texting with mobile phones could well be an emerging disease. 

So, WhatsAppitis is to smartphones as Carpal tunnel syndrome is to keyboard.