Climber's finger is one of the most common climbing injuries within the sport of rock climbing. It is an overuse injury that usually manifests in a swollen middle or ring finger due to a damaged flexor tendon pulley, normally the A2 or A4 pulley. It is caused by a climber trying to support his or her body weight with one or two fingers, and is particularly common after a repeated utilization of small holds. Continued climbing on an injured finger may result in increased downtime in order to recover.

Damage to the flexor tendon pulleys that encircle and support the tendons that cross the finger joints is the most common finger injury within the sport (see climber's finger).

The main culprit for pulley related injuries is the common crimp grip, especially in the closed position. The crimp grip requires a near ninety-degree flexion of the middle finger joint, which produces a tremendous force load on the A2 pulley. Injuries to the A2 pulley can range from microscopic to partial tears and, in the worst case, complete ruptures. Some climbers report hearing a pop, which might be a sign of a significant tear or complete rupture, during an extremely heavy move (e.g. tiny crimp, one- or two-finger pocket). Small partial tears, or inflammation can occur over the course of several sessions.

- Grade I – Sprain of the finger ligaments (collateral ligaments), pain locally at the pulley, pain when squeezing or climbing.

- Grade II – Partial rupture of the pulley tendon. Pain locally at the pulley, pain when squeezing or climbing, possible pain while extending your finger.

- Grade III – Complete rupture of the pulley, causing bowstringing of the tendon. Symptoms can include: Pain locally at the pulley (usually sharp), may feel/hear a 'pop' or 'crack', swelling and possible bruising, pain when squeezing or climbing, pain when extending your finger, pain with resisted flexion of the finger.

Shoulder related injuries include rotator cuff tear, strain or tendinitis, biceps tendinitis and SLAP lesion.

Finger injuries are usually diagnosed with x-ray and can get to be considerably painful. The majority of finger injuries can be dealt with conservative care and splints. However, if the bone presents an abnormal angularity or if it is displaced, one may need surgery and pins to hold the bones in place.

The symptoms are pain and tenderness in the specific location of the hand, which corresponds to the metacarpal bone around the knuckle. When a fracture occurs, there may be a snapping or popping sensation. There will be swelling of the hand along with discoloration or bruising in the affected area. Abrasions or lacerations of the hand are also likely to occur. The respective finger may be misaligned, and movement of that finger may be limited and painful.

A "Jersey finger" is an injury to an FDP tendon at its point of attachment to the distal phalanx. This injury often occurs in American football when a player grabs another player's jersey with the tips of one or more fingers while that player is pulling or running away. The force of this action hyperextends the tip of the finger at the DIP joint while the proximal portion of the finger is flexed. This action can partially or completely rupture the FDP tendon at or near its attachment point on the distal phalanx. Sometimes, the force is great enough to pull off or avulse a piece of phalangeal bone to which the tendon can remain attached. Although it is a common football injury, this injury can occur during other sports or activities as well.

After the injury occurs, the torn FDP tendon may retract slightly, remaining in the finger near the PIP joint, or can retract more fully into the palm of the hand. A person who suffers a jersey finger injury in which the FDP tendon is completely ruptured cannot flex the affected digit at the DIP joint without assistance.

Signs and Symptoms include:

- A pop or rip felt in the finger at the time of the injury

- Pain when moving the injured finger and the inability to bend the DIPjoint

- Tenderness, swelling. and warmth of the injured finger

- Bruising after 48 hours

- Occasionally a lump felt in the palm of the finger

- Mallet finger deformity

Ice and elevation may help reduce pain and swelling, and allow the injury to begin to recover.

Severe sprains accompanied by significant pain and swelling may need to be immobilized.

As these are colloquial terms, texts and medical dictionaries do not universally agree on precise meanings. Various authorities state that a "boxer's fracture" means a break in specifically the second metacarpal bone or third metacarpal bone, with "bar room fracture" being specific to the fourth metacarpal bone or fifth metacarpal bone. Though some writers assert that boxer's fracture and bar room fracture are distinct terms representing injuries to different bones, this distinction seems to have been lost and most medical professionals now describe any metacarpal fracture as a "boxer's fracture" .

Fractures of the fingers occur when the finger or hands hit a solid object. Fractures are most common at the base of the little finger (boxer's fracture).

Nerve injuries occur as a result of trauma, compression or over-stretching. Nerves send impulses to the brain about sensation and also play an important role in finger movement. When nerves are injured, one can lose ability to move fingers, lose sensation and develop a contracture. Any nerve injury of the hand can be disabling and results in loss of hand function. Thus it is vital to seek medical help as soon as possible after any hand injury.

Sprains result from forcing a joint to perform against its normal range of motion. Finger sprains occur when the ligaments which are attached to the bone are overstretched and this results in pain, swelling, and difficulty for moving the finger. Common examples of a sprain are jammed or twisted fingers. These injuries are common among ball players but can also occur in laborers and handy men. When finger sprains are not treated on time, prolonged disability can result.

A mallet finger is an extensor tendon injury at the farthest away finger joint. This results in the inability to extend the finger tip without pushing it. There is generally pain and bruising at the back side of the farthest away finger joint.

A mallet finger usually results from over bending of the finger tip. Typically this occurs when a ball hits an outstretched finger and jams it. This results in either a tear of the tendon or the tendon pulling off a bit of bone. The diagnosis is generally based on symptoms and supported by X-rays.

Treatment is generally with a splint that holds the finger straight continuously for 8 weeks. This should be begun within a week of the injury. If the finger is bent during these weeks, healing may take longer. If a large piece of bone has been torn off surgery may be recommended. Without proper treatment a permanent deformity of the finger may occur.

The Jersey Finger is a finger-related tendon injury that is common in athletics and can result in permanent loss of flexion of the end of the finger if not surgically repaired.

This injury often occurs in American football when a player grabs another player's jersey with the tips of one or more fingers while that player is pulling or running away.

The term jammed finger refers to finger joint pain and swelling from an impact injury. It's the most common injury in sports. This injury tends to be very painful, and immediate treatment will usually help heal the joint faster. Most jammed fingers heal relatively quickly, if no fracture occurs. If there is a fracture, however, the healing process will take longer; anywhere from one or two weeks to several months, and the methods of healing will become more in depth. Toes can become jammed as well, but not as often as fingers.

The diagnosis is generally based on symptoms and supported by X-rays.

Trigger fingers is a common disorder characterized by catching, snapping or locking of the involved finger flexor tendon, associated with dysfunction and pain. It is a sub-set of stenosing tenosynovitis.

A disparity in size between the flexor tendon and the surrounding retinacular pulley system, most commonly at the level of the first annular (A1) pulley, results in difficulty flexing or extending the finger and the "triggering" phenomenon. The label of trigger finger is used because when the finger unlocks, it pops back suddenly, as if releasing a trigger on a gun.

Typically, Dupuytren's contracture first presents as a thickening or nodule in the palm, which initially can be with or without pain. Later in the disease process, there is painless increasing loss of range of motion of the affected fingers. The earliest sign of a contracture is a triangular “puckering” of the skin of the palm as it passes over the flexor tendon just before the flexor crease of the finger, at the metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joint. Generally, the cords or contractures are painless, but, rarely, tenosynovitis can occur and produce pain. The most common finger to be affected is the ring finger; the thumb and index finger are much less often affected. The disease begins in the palm and moves towards the fingers, with the metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joints affected before the proximal interphalangeal (PIP) joints.

In Dupuytren's contracture, the palmar fascia within the hand becomes abnormally thick, which can cause the fingers to curl and can impair finger function. The main function of the palmar fascia is to increase grip strength; thus, over time, Dupuytren's contracture decreases a person's ability to hold objects. People may report pain, aching and itching with the contractions. Normally, the palmar fascia consists of collagen type I, but in Dupuytren sufferers, the collagen changes to collagen type III, which is significantly thicker than collagen type I.

Management of tendon injuries in the fingers is to follow the RICE method.

- Immediately cease climbing and any other activity that puts stress on the injured finger. Consult a doctor if there is noticeable "bowstringing" on the flexor tendon or if you are the least unsure about the nature of the injury.

- There are different theories out there for the preferred line of approach. Some argue for the use of NSAIDs and ice for visible swelling only, others argue diclofenac sodium should be applied and carefully rubbed in on the injury until the swelling starts to give.

- When the pain and swelling is gone (depending of the grade of the injury, 1–4 weeks), begin with an active healing process – containing squeezing putty clay or a stress ball. Combine this with light massage and mild stretching to ensure your finger will heal properly and better prepared for future stress. The use of heating pads and cold water baths are also mentioned in several sources in order to increase blood flow. Use this therapy for about twice as long as the previous resting period (2–8 weeks) before gradually returning, with the utmost care, to climbing.

- Gradually return to climbing while using prophylactic taping every time you climb, and spend the first weeks climbing relatively easy routes with big holds, good footholds and keep your sessions short and stay away from overhangs and campus areas/boards.

- Return to full-force climbing if easy climbing yields no pain. Continue taping (it will also serve as a mental note of the previous injury) and avoid tweaky crimps and pockets for several months, since complete tendon healing can take 100 days or more.

Golfer's elbow, or medial epicondylitis, is tendinosis of the medial epicondyle on the inside of the elbow. It is in some ways similar to tennis elbow, which affects the outside at the lateral epicondyle.

The anterior forearm contains several muscles that are involved with flexing the digits of the hand, and flexing and pronating the wrist. The tendons of these muscles come together in a common tendinous sheath, which originates from the medial epicondyle of the humerus at the elbow joint. In response to minor injury, or sometimes for no obvious reason at all, this point of insertion becomes inflamed.

Stenosing tenosynovitis often presents with a painful and swollen thumb with limited range of motion, or a ring finger or middle finger with similarly limited motion. There is often a feeling of catching when the thumb is flexed. In the ring and middle fingers, often a nodule can be felt when you press the area of the hand where the palm meets the finger.

People with severe involvement often show lumps on the back of their finger joints (called “Garrod's pads”, “knuckle pads”, or “dorsal Dupuytren nodules”) and lumps in the arch of the feet (plantar fibromatosis or Ledderhose disease). In severe cases, the area where the palm meets the wrist may develop lumps. Severe Dupuytren disease may also be associated with frozen shoulder (adhesive capsulitis of shoulder), Peyronie's disease of the penis, increased risk of several types of cancer, and risk of early death, but more research is needed to clarify these relationships.

The condition is called "Golfer's Elbow" because in making a golf swing this tendon is stressed, especially if a non-overlapping (baseball style) grip is used; many people, however, who develop the condition have never handled a golf club. It is also sometimes called "Pitcher's Elbow" due to the same tendon being stressed by the throwing of objects such as a baseball, but this usage is much less frequent. Other names are "Climber's Elbow" and "Little League Elbow": all of the flexors of the fingers and the pronators of the forearm insert at the medial epicondyle of the humerus to include: pronator teres, flexor carpi radialis, flexor carpi ulnaris, flexor digitorum superficialis, and palmaris longus; making this the most common elbow injury for rock climbers, whose sport is very grip intensive. The pain is normally caused due to stress on the tendon as a result of the large amount of grip exerted by the digits and torsion of the wrist which is caused by the use and action of the cluster of muscles on the condyle of the ulna.

Epicondylitis is much more common on the lateral side of the elbow (tennis elbow), rather than the medial side. In most cases, its onset is gradual and symptoms often persist for weeks before patients seek care. In golfer's elbow, pain at the medial epicondyle is aggravated by resisted wrist flexion and pronation, which is used to aid diagnosis. On the other hand, tennis elbow is indicated by the presence of lateral epicondylar pain precipitated by resisted wrist extension. Although the condition is poorly understood at a cellular and molecular level, there are hypotheses that point to apoptosis and autophagic cell death as causes of chronic lateral epicondylitis. The cell death may decrease the muscle density and cause a snowball effect in muscle weakness - this susceptibility can compromise a muscle's ability to maintain its integrity. So athletes, like pitchers, must work on preventing this cell death via flexibility training and other preventive measures.

Nintendo thumb, also known as gamer's grip, Nintendonitis and similar names, is a video game-related health problem classified as a form of repetitive strain injury (RSI). The symptoms are the blistering, paraesthesia and swelling of the thumbs, mainly through use of the D-pad, though any finger can be affected. This can lead to stress on tendons, nerves and ligaments in the hands, and further onto lateral epicondylitis ("tennis elbow"), tendinitis, bursitis and carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS).

Some of the symptoms are described under trigger finger.

Originally known in a video gaming context as "Leather Thumb", this condition was known to occur frequently among users of 2nd generation video game consoles such as the Intellivision or the Atari 2600 in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The condition was first highlighted when the Nintendo games consoles were released, leading to reported cases of RSI, primarily in children (being one of the primary audiences of early-generation videogames). Later, the controllers for the Sony PlayStation and PlayStation 2 were noted as causing the condition. However, due to the shape, size and extended use of game controllers it is not limited to just those specific ones and can occur in users of any gamepad or joystick. Similar problems have also been observed with the use of mobile phones, and text messaging in particular (see Blackberry thumb).

Some examples of symptoms experienced by patients with RSI are aching, pulsing pain, tingling and extremity weakness, initially presenting with intermittent discomfort and then, with a higher degree of frequency.

Stenosing tenosynovitis (also known as trigger finger or trigger thumb) is a painful condition caused by the inflammation (tenosynovitis) and progressive restriction of the superficial and deep flexors fibrous tendon sheath adjacent to the A1 pulley at a metacarpal head. Repetitive forceful compression, tensile stress, and resistive flexion, causes inflammation, swelling, and microtrauma, that results in thickening (commonly a nodular formation) of the tendon distal to the pulley and stenosis of the tendon sheath leading to a painful digital base, limitation of finger movements, triggering, snapping, locking, and deformity progressively.

Patients report a popping sound at the proximal interphalangeal joint (PIP), morning stiffness with/without triggering, delayed and sometimes painful extension of the digit, and when more advanced, a locking position that requires manipulation to extend the affected finger. This condition more commonly affects the middle and ring fingers (occasionally the thumb), and the flexor rather than extensor tendons in the hand.

In rheumatic trigger finger (or in diabetes), more than one finger may be involved. Cases of stenosing peroneal tenosynovitis, have been reported where the patient presents with pain over the lateral malleolus, both with active and passive range of motion and no physical of radiographic evidence of instability.

Pain and soft-tissue swelling are present at the distal-third radial fracture site and at the wrist joint. This injury is confirmed on radiographic evaluation. Forearm trauma may be associated with compartment syndrome. Anterior interosseous nerve (AIN) palsy may also be present, but it is easily missed because there is no sensory component to this finding. A purely motor nerve, the AIN is a division of the median nerve. Injury to the AIN can cause paralysis of the flexor pollicis longus and flexor digitorum profundus muscles to the index finger, resulting in loss of the pinch mechanism between the thumb and index finger. Galeazzi fractures are sometimes associated with wrist drop due to injury to radial nerve, extensor tendons or muscles.

Injuries to the arm, forearm or wrist area can lead to various nerve disorders. One such disorder is median nerve palsy. The median nerve controls the majority of the muscles in the forearm. It controls abduction of the thumb, flexion of hand at wrist, flexion of digital phalanx of the fingers, is the sensory nerve for the first three fingers, etc. Because of this major role of the median nerve, it is also called the eye of the hand. If the median nerve is damaged, the ability to abduct and oppose the thumb may be lost due to paralysis of the thenar muscles. Various other symptoms can occur which may be repaired through surgery and tendon transfers. Tendon transfers have been very successful in restoring motor function and improving functional outcomes in patients with median nerve palsy.