Doctors identify 'PlayStation palm' as a legitimate medical complaint!
PlayStation palmar hidradenitis is a serious issue for some...
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After repetitive strain injury and “texter’s thumb” researchers have identified a new skin disorder caused by excessive use of new technology — “PlayStation palm”.
Caused by over-enthusiastic handling of the “joypads” used to control gaming consoles, the condition causes painful sore patches on the palms of the hands.
Swiss doctors writing in the British Journal of Dermatology report having spotted the symptoms in an unnamed 12-year-old girl whose injuries had appeared over a period of four weeks.
A medical team at Geneva University Hospital diagnosed “idiopathic eccrine hidradenitis” - a skin disorder that produces red, sore lumps on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet.
“Idiopathic” conditions refer to an unknown cause, but the girl’s parents recalled that a few days days before the sores appeared, their daughter had started using her PlayStation gaming console for several hours a day.
The doctors suspected that tight and continuous grasping of the console’s controls together with repeated pushing of the buttons caused the injuries to the girl’s hands. Stopping all console gaming for 10 days led to her making a full recovery.
Reporting the case the Swiss authors, led by Behrooz Kasraee, wrote: “The final diagnosis in our patient was idiopathic palmar eccrine hidradenitis. However, we propose that the variant in this patient can be labelled more specifically as ‘PlayStation palmar hidradenitis’.
“Excessive video gaming is currently regarded as an alarming health issue... Recently, organic pathologies such as acute tendonitis, called Wiiitis, or video game-induced knuckle pads have been added to the list of video game-related pathologies. We report... ’PlayStation palmar hidradenitis’ as a cutaneous (skin) pathology induced by console gaming.”
Nina Goad, from the British Association of Dermatologists, which publishes the journal, said: “This is an interesting discovery and one that the researchers are keen to share with other dermatologists, should they be confronted with similar, unexplained symptoms in a patient.
“If you’re worried about soreness on your hands when playing a games console, it might be sensible to give your hands a break from time-to-time and don’t play excessively if your hands are prone to sweating.”
A spokesman for Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Ltd, manufacturers of PlayStation, which has sold hundreds of millions of consoles since their launch in 1995, said: “We firmly believe that video gaming is a legitimate entertainment pastime like watching movies, listening to music, or reading books."
“As with any leisure pursuit there are possible consequences of not following common sense, health advice and guidelines, as can be found within our instruction manuals.
“We do not wish to belittle this research and will study the findings with interest. This is the first time we have ever heard of a complaint of this nature.”
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Mmm...Mmm... interesting...
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