Manhattan clinics offer special massage to cure “Blackberry thumb”

If you’ve ever spent a few months pecking at your Blackberry or Treo, you’re familiar with the dull ache that emerges in your shoulder blades, and the pinching sensation in your thumbs. It’s gotten so bad now that in Manhattan — ground zero for the dirty-bomb of self-induced workplace stress in America — orthopedic surgeons and chiropractors have begun to offer special “Tech Neck” and “Tech Hand” massages, according to New York magazine.

Graceful Services owner Grace Macnow remembers the first time she got a call asking if it offered BlackBerry finger massage. “My receptionist thought it was something dirty and slammed down the phone.” Now she charges $60 an hour for the service.

My personal favorite PDA-related injury, though, is the “Blackberry Collision” — i.e. when one gormless manager, head-down and utterly engrossed in composing his latest handheld missive, slams into another similarly-engaged employee while traveling at full tilt down the corporate hallway. Wham! Sometimes there’s blood.


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I'm Clive Thompson, the author of Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better (Penguin Press). You can order the book now at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Powells, Indiebound, or through your local bookstore! I'm also a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and a columnist for Wired magazine. Email is here or ping me via the antiquated form of AOL IM (pomeranian99).

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Collision Detection: A Blog by Clive Thompson