If you’ve been diagnosed with trigger finger, your choice of mouse can play a important role in mitigating your condition.
The best mouse for trigger finger should reduce or eliminate the force or movement required to press the main buttons on the mouse.
There are other pointing devices that have strategically placed buttons so you can use your other fingers to press them.
Trigger Finger and its Symptoms
Trigger finger or stenosing tenosynovitis occurs when the tendon sheaths surrounding the affected finger become inflamed. As a result, it becomes difficult to bend and straighten the affected finger.
Symptoms include:
- Stiff fingers, especially in the morning
- A popping or clicking sensation when moving the finger
- Tenderness at the base of the affected finger
- Finger locking in a bent position
Computer users are at a high risk of developing trigger finger due to the repetitive movement required to press the mouse buttons. Constantly gripping the mouse can also make you more susceptible to developing this ergonomic malady.
1. RollerMouse Red
The RollerMouse Red is placed right in front of your keyboard so you can easily access it with both hands. By scrolling a roller bar and moving it right to left, you can achieve similar precision to a mouse. Customize the entire button panel and choose between 10 cursor speeds to maximize your comfort. You can even adjust the tension settings to make it responsive to the lightest touch.
The RollerMouse encourages posture variation and allows you to use both left and right hands to mouse. By spreading the repetitive movements to different fingers and hands, the strain on your affected fingers is significantly reduced. What’s more, this assistive device requires no gripping.
In terms of performance, it works flawlessly even when working with multiple monitors thanks to a DPI of up to 2800. You can easily tweak the speed with a button.
2. iClever TM209G Ergonomic Mouse
When a mouse is a poor fit relative to the size of your hand, you unconsciously try to make it fit by gripping too hard or stretching your fingers too far. For users suffering from trigger finger, this can worsen your condition.
The iClever is a versatile mouse that’s suitable for most average people’s hands (medium to large). Thanks to its horseshoe shape, you can decide how firm you want’ to grip it. Plus, the area where your palm meets the mouse has grooves to avoid slipping.
The buttons take less effort to depress, which is a plus if you have trigger finger. There are two thumb buttons – the backward and forward page buttons – which can lessen the clicks you have to do with your index finger.
3. Evoluent Vertical Mouse 4
The Evoluent 4 has an aggressive vertical form which comes in different sizes and left and right handed designs. The shape keeps your hand and wrist healthy with an almost perfect handshake position.
To prevent or mitigate trigger finger, you can customize the 6 buttons. For example, if your pointer finger is starting to lose its dexterity and flexibility, you can set the thumb button to right click. The buttons are also decently sensitive so you’ll only have to apply minimal force.
Another great thing about the Evoluent 4 is its middle button. By default, using it to click on links will open them in a new tab in the background. That’s CTRL + left click or right click + left click if you do it manually. What’s more you can set it to do some other multi-step command if needed, reducing the number of clicks you do while mousing.
4. Perixx PERIPAD-504 Touchpad
A touchpad like the Peripad eliminates risk factors like gripping and finger fatigue due to clicking. You just have to glide over the touchpad’s surface and lightly tap to click. It also supports multi-gestures like zoom in and out, tap and drag, and double click.
To prevent your dominant hand from getting tired, you can use your other hand to operate it. You can even switch the primary and secondary button from the system setting if it’s easier for you. If you’re having problems with mouse sensitivity, just go to the mouse setting on Windows and tweak it to your liking.
The Peripad is a wired touchpad so you won’t have to worry about running out of juice. It also comes in two sizes so pick one that’s suitable for the space you have.
5. Kensington Orbit Trackball Mouse
Last but not least is the Kensington Orbit, a trackball mouse which you can operate with either hands, palm, and fingers. This means that it can effectively balance the strain of mousing to different parts of both hands, mitigating trigger finger. There’s also no gripping required since you just need to spin the dynamic sphere.
It comes with a detachable contoured area for your hand to rest on while using the mouse. This hand support makes it slightly more ergonomic than touchpads.
Scrolling is more efficient with the scroll ring around the trackball. The Kensington Orbit also comes with a downloadable software that will allow you to assign different functions to the two buttons. The buttons on each side are very sensitive to touch which is a big plus if you want to minimize strain on your finger.
