Hand swelling. From tribute night garmenn

bhd1

hi folks. I have the tribute night vest w night sleeve that attaches at the shoulder. It causes slight swelling of hand and wrist. Any suggestions?

Kicks

I use an opera lenght Isotoner glove under my Tribute sleeve at the suggestion of my CLET guy (he gives them to me).    My Tribute has a gauntlet style hand portion which doesn't give fingers and hand what they need but the slight compression from the Isotoner does.  I first tried the wrist length glove but like the opera length better as it is continuous to slightly above the elbow.  The are made by Isotoner and the seams are to the outside.

bhd1

what is clet guy?

carol57

Barb, she's referring to her Certified Lymphedema Therapist.

bhd1

thx carol. If the tribute is too tight in the hand would that cause hand swelling?

carol57

Not sure about that, Barb. If too tight in the wrist or lower arm, it might send fluid down to the hand. Some Tributes are made with finger separators to apply compression to the fingers. Mine is gauntlet style and so far (knock wood) it has not sent fluid into my hand. Kicks' isotoner glove idea sounds interesting as a way to control for hand swelling. I'm confused at the thought of the opera length going up toward the elbow, because I thought it was the bumpy foam chips and the channeling that did the Tribute magic. A glove running up the arm would prevent that from working. Having said that, clearly it works for kicks!

Kicks

Yup Barb - my 'CLET Guy' is my Certified LymphEdema Therapist.  He also has his Masters in OT.

Carol - I wasn't sure rather or not Tributes could be gotten with fingers or not as when my Guy ordered mine he ordered it with a gauntlet style hand.  I never thought about rather or not it did.  Looking back I now realize that there was not probably a realistic hope of getting fingers to fit my crazy hand.   We'd already been having major problems getting my gloves to fit and not cut into the skin between my fingers.  My hands are somewhat webbed  (never realized it - just thought that I had short fingers which was why reg. gloves [work/winter/etc.] never fit right), so it took quite a while to get my custom gloves right so they weren't so painful between fingers thata I had to tak them often for relief and so they didn't cut in making open sores.  So I thhink it probably been almost inpossible to get a fingered Tribute with it being so bulky.  

The chips and the channeling are the magic of Tributes.   The Isotoner glove does not stop it from working.  The pattern from the Tribute on my arm when I take it off is the same rather I've had the glove on or not.  (I usually wear it but occasionally don't put it on for whatever reason.)  The glove is a very thin/light material that is slightly/gently stretchy - nothing like a compression sleeve/glove.  I'm trying to think of something similar but can't come up with anything exact. The closest I can come up with is the gloves are a bit thicker than my opaque tights/legging and a maybe a bit thinner than my light thinsilate winter underwear (not to be confused with the heavy waffle-weave thermies).  Hope that gives you an idea of how thin they are.

They are made by Isotoner - the Isotoner tag is attached.  The seams are made to the outside - not just turned inside out - so the inside is smoother. They come individually wrapped - not as a pair.  I don't know what all they are used for (never asked) but my Guy already had boxes of them when he gave me my first ones.  So they do have other uses than just with BC LE.   Though he'd been a CLET for several years, I was only the 2nd BC LE he'd dealt with so I know that there has to be other uses for the gloves or he would't have had so many.   No - that's not all that strange - He's with VA so there are a lot more men seen there than us women.

Marple

Kira has written about problems with the hand and Tribute night sleeve. If you use the 'search' option and punch in 'Tribute' in the keyword space and 'Kira' in the member name space, you'll see where she's commented about it.

carol57

kicks, thank you for that great, detailed explanation. It's something others might like to try. I'm surprised that the Tribute channels works through the glove--surprised in a delighted way.

bhd1

I notice my hand swells when i wear a glove too. Maybe a glove is not good for me? My hand swelling goes down in the morning when i just wear a sleeve with nothing on the hand. It is fine all day until the next morning after wearing the tribute vest with sleeve!