Description and Possible Medical Problems
It seems that we’ve been trained from birth to regard any new lumps or bumps that appear on our bodies with a suspicious eye and a brain trained to think of the “C word”: cancer. Therefore, whenever a lump or bump turns out to be something else and is actually harmless, the relief is usually palpable.
This is the good news if you notice a lump or bump that appears on the back of your wrist, called a ganglion cyst. It’s usually painless and occurs when a gellike material escapes from a joint or a synovium, a tendon sheath in your wrist. It collects in one spot, causing the area to swell up, and may be either soft or hard.
Treatment
If you think you have a ganglion cyst, you should see your doctor. Though you’re probably reading your Body Signals correctly, the chance does exist that the growth is a tumor or a malignant growth. Your doctor will do an X ray and/or a sonogram to help determine the status of the growth. If, as in most cases, he does discover a ganglion cyst, he will drain it with a needle while applying pressure to it, to make sure none of the gel remains.
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