How many times a day do you use your hands? Have you ever imagined how completely useless you would feel if you couldn’t open a door or turn a steering wheel? As we age, the ease with which we perform every day tasks become difficult. The ability to use our hands is the last thing we expect to diminish, but over time our muscle strength, dexterity and joint range decrease and severely limit us from doing even the simplest of tasks. This is especially true nowadays with hours spent at our keyboards and text messaging on our cell phones.

Unlike exercising the body, hand exercises can be done anywhere at any time. I find that one good way of exercising your hands at work is to put a thick rubber band around the outside of your fingers and spread them apart slowly, which feels really good after a lot of time spent typing on the computer. A rubber band is probably the easiest thing to find if you are looking to get in a good hand stretch at your office or in your home.

Other ways of strengthening your hand muscles include squeezing and releasing something in your hand. Anything from a tennis ball to a small bean bag or even a crumpled piece of paper will do. Squeeze the object as hard as you can without causing pain, hold for 5 seconds, and release.

Another easy exercise that does not require any object at all is to spread your fingers apart as wide as possible, hold them apart for 5 seconds, and bring them back together slowly, repeating the exercise with each hand.

For a nice finger and wrist stretch, hold one hand out in front of you with fingers pointed towards the ceiling, as though you were motioning for someone in front of you to halt. Use your other hand to gently pull back each finger towards you, before gently pulling them all back towards you at the same time. This will loosen stiff fingers and stretch out the palm.

Our hands are so vital to our productivity, yet they are often so easy to neglect. Be sure to dedicate a couple of minutes every other hour or so to stretching your fingers and hands so you are less likely to develop chronic hand pain in the future!

References:

http://www.physioadvisor.com.au/8117950/hand-exercises-hand-strengthening-hand-rehabil.htm

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/arthritis/AR00030

http://www.stretchnow.com.au/exercises/hands.htm