Other symptoms of peripheral neuropathy include:
What Causes Numbness in Hands?
Numbness in your hands is not always a cause for concern. It could be a sign of carpal tunnel or a medication side effect.
When a medical condition causes numbness in your hands, you’ll usually have other symptoms along with it. Here’s what to watch for and when to contact your doctor, as well as treatments for the underlying causes.
1. Stroke
Numbness in your hands usually is not a sign of an emergency.
Although unlikely, it’s possible that hand numbness could be a sign of a stroke. A stroke is brain damage caused by decreased blood supply to a region of your brain.
Hand numbness can be the only sign of a stroke, or it can occur with other symptoms. Prompt treatment may reduce your risk for long-term brain damage. It may even save your life.
- sudden weakness or numbness in your arm or leg, especially if it’s only on one side of your body
- trouble speaking or understanding others
- confusion
- drooping of your face
- sudden trouble seeing out of one or both eyes
- sudden dizziness or loss of balance
- sudden severe headache
2. Carpal tunnel
The carpal tunnel is a narrow passageway that runs through the center of your wrist. In the center of this tunnel is the median nerve. This nerve supplies feeling to your fingers, including your thumb, index, middle, and part of your ring finger.
Repetitive activities like typing or working on an assembly line can cause the tissues around the median nerve to swell up and put pressure on this nerve. The pressure can cause numbness along with tingling, pain, and weakness in the affected hand.
If the condition persists, it can cause permanent nerve damage. Sometimes surgery is necessary to relieve the pressure.
3. Vitamin or mineral deficiency
You need vitamin B12 to keep your nerves healthy. Severe B12 deficiency can cause numbness in your hands and feet on both sides of your body.
Potassium and magnesium deficiency may also cause numbness.
The most common symptom of a vitamin B12 deficiency is fatigue. Other symptoms may include:
- weakness
- trouble walking and balancing
- difficulty thinking clearly
- seeing things that are not there (hallucinations)
4. Certain medications
Nerve damage (neuropathy) can be a side effect of several different medications, especially those that treat cancer. It can affect both your hands and feet.
Some of the medications that can cause numbness include:
- Antibiotics. These include metronidazole (Flagyl), nitrofurantoin (Macrobid), and fluoroquinolones (Cipro).
- Anticancer drugs. Cisplatin and vincristine are examples.
- Antiseizure drugs. An example is phenytoin (Dilantin).
- Heart or blood pressure drugs. These include amiodarone (Nexterone) and hydralazine (Apresoline).
Other symptoms of drug-induced nerve damage include:
- decreased sensation
- tingling
- atypical feelings in your hands
- weakness
5. Slipped cervical disc
Discs are the soft cushions that separate the bones (vertebrae) of your spine. A disruption in the structure of your spinal column may cause movement of the disk. This is called a herniated, or slipped, disc.
Swelling around the nerve, a damaged disc, or degeneration of the bones of your spine can put pressure on and irritate the nerves of your spine. In addition to numbness, a slipped disc can cause weakness or pain in your arm or leg.
6. Raynaud’s disease
Also called Raynaud’s phenomenon, this vascular condition affects some people who are predisposed to it.
The symptoms occur when your blood vessels narrow, reducing the amount of blood reaching your hands and feet. The decreased blood flow makes your fingers and toes become numb, cold, pale, and painful.
These symptoms typically appear from cold exposure or stress.
7. Cubital tunnel syndrome
The ulnar nerve runs from your neck to your hand on the pinky side. The nerve can become compressed or overstretched at the inner aspect of your elbow. This can happen after prolonged positions put pressure on your elbow or due to swelling from repetitive movement.
Doctors refer to this condition as cubital tunnel syndrome. This is the same nerve area you may affect when you hit your “funny bone.”
Cubital tunnel syndrome can cause symptoms such as hand numbness and tingling, especially in your ring and pinky fingers. A person may also experience forearm pain and weakness in their hand, especially when they bend their elbow.
8. Cervical spondylosis
Cervical spondylosis is a type of arthritis that affects the discs in your neck. It’s caused by years of wear on your spinal bones. The damaged vertebrae can press on nearby nerves, causing numbness in your hands, arms, and fingers.
Most people with cervical spondylosis do not have any symptoms. Others may feel pain and stiffness in their neck.
This condition can progress and may also cause:
- weakness in your arms, hands, legs, or feet
- headaches
- a popping noise when you move your neck
- loss of balance and coordination
- muscle spasms in your neck or shoulders
- loss of control over your bowels or bladder
9. Lupus
Lupus is an autoimmune disease. This means your body attacks your own organs and tissues. It causes inflammation in many organs and tissues, including your:
Symptoms of lupus come and go. Which symptoms you have depends on which parts of your body are affected.
Pressure from inflammation can damage nerves and lead to numbness or tingling in your hands. Other common symptoms include:
- a butterfly-shaped rash on your face
- fatigue
- joint pain, stiffness, and swelling
- sun sensitivity
- fingers and toes that turn cold and blue (Raynaud’s phenomenon)
- shortness of breath
- headaches
- confusion
- trouble concentrating
- vision problems
10. Ganglion cyst
Ganglion cysts are fluid-filled growths. They form on tendons or joints in your wrists or hands. They can grow to an inch or more in diameter and they usually look like a lump on your hand.
If these cysts press on a nearby nerve, they can cause numbness, pain, or weakness in your hand.
11. Diabetes
If you are living with diabetes, your body will have trouble moving sugar from your bloodstream into your cells. Having high blood sugar for a long period of time can lead to nerve damage called diabetic neuropathy.
Peripheral neuropathy is the type of nerve damage that causes numbness in your arms, hands, legs, and feet.
Other symptoms of peripheral neuropathy include:
- burning
- a pins-and-needles feeling
- weakness
- pain
- loss of balance
12. Thyroid disorder
The thyroid gland in your neck produces hormones that help regulate your body’s metabolism. An underactive thyroid, or hypothyroidism, happens when your thyroid produces too little of its hormones.
Untreated hypothyroidism can also cause peripheral neuropathy. It can cause numbness, weakness, and tingling in your hands and feet.
13. Alcohol-related neuropathy
Alcohol is safe to drink in small amounts, but too much can damage some tissues, including your nerves. Drinking large amounts of alcohol or drinking while having conditions such as kidney or liver disease could lead to numbness and tingling in your hands and feet.
- a pins-and-needles feeling
- muscle weakness
- muscle cramps or spasms
- trouble controlling urination
- erectile dysfunction
14. Fibromyalgia
Fibromyalgia is a condition that causes fatigue and muscle pain. It’s sometimes confused with chronic fatigue syndrome because the symptoms are so similar. The fatigue with fibromyalgia can be intense. The pain is centered in various tender points around your body.
People with fibromyalgia may also have numbness and tingling in their hands, arms, feet, legs, and face.
Other symptoms include:
- depression
- trouble concentrating
- sleep problems
- headaches
- belly pain
- constipation
- diarrhea
15. Lyme disease
Deer ticks infected with bacteria can transmit Lyme disease to humans through a bite. People who contract the bacteria that cause Lyme disease first develop a rash shaped like a bull’s-eye and flu-like symptoms, such as fever and chills.
Later symptoms of this disease include:
- numbness in your arms or legs
- joint pain and swelling
- temporary paralysis on one side of your face
- fever, stiff neck, and severe headache
- weakness
- trouble moving muscles
16. Epicondylitis
Lateral epicondylitis is called “tennis elbow” because it’s caused by a repetitive motion, like swinging a tennis racket. The repeated motion damages muscles and tendons in your forearm, causing pain and burning on the outside of your elbow. This is very unlikely to cause any numbness in your hands.
Medial epicondylitis is a similar condition nicknamed “golfer’s elbow.” It causes pain on the inside of your elbow as well as possible weakness, numbness, or tingling in your hands, especially in your pinky and ring fingers. It may lead to numbness if there’s significant swelling around this area that’s causing dysfunction in the ulnar nerve. But this is very rare.
17. Multiple sclerosis
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune disease where your immune system attacks the protective coating around nerve fibers. Over time, the nerves become damaged.
Symptoms depend on which nerves are affected. Numbness and tingling are among the most common symptoms. Your arms, face, or legs may lose feeling. The numbness is usually only on one side of your body.
Other symptoms include:
- vision loss
- double vision
- tingling
- weakness
- electric-shock sensations
- trouble with coordination or walking
- slurred speech
- tiredness
- loss of control over your bladder or bowels
Tingling in Hands and Feet
Tingling hands, feet, or both is an extremely common and bothersome symptom. Such tingling can sometimes be benign and temporary. For example, it could result from pressure on nerves when your arm is crooked under your head as you fall asleep. Or it could be from pressure on nerves when you cross your legs too long. In either case, the “pins and needles” effect — which is usually painless — is soon relieved by removing the pressure that caused it.
But in many cases, tingling in the hands, feet, or both can be severe, episodic, or chronic. It also can come with other symptoms, such as pain, itching, numbness, and muscle wasting. In such cases, tingling may be a sign of nerve damage, which can result from causes as varied as traumatic injuries or repetitive stress injuries, bacterial or viral infections, toxic exposures, and systemic diseases such as diabetes.
Such nerve damage is known as peripheral neuropathy because it affects nerves distant from the brain and spinal cord, often in the hands and feet. There are more than 100 types of peripheral neuropathy. Over time, the condition can worsen, making you less mobile and even disabled. More than 20 million Americans, most of them older adults, are estimated to have peripheral neuropathy.
It’s important to get medical help right away for any tingling in your hands, feet, or both that’s lasted a while. The earlier the cause of your tingling is found and brought under control, the less likely you are to get what could be lifelong problems.
Causes of Tingling in the Hands and Feet
Diabetes is one of the most common causes of peripheral neuropathy, accounting for about 30% of cases. In diabetic neuropathy, tingling and other symptoms often first develop in both feet and go up the legs, followed by tingling and other symptoms that affect both hands and go up the arms. About two-thirds of people with diabetes have mild to severe forms of nerve damage. In many cases, these symptoms are the first signs of diabetes.
In another 30% of peripheral neuropathy cases, the cause is unknown, or “idiopathic.”
The remaining 40% of cases have a variety of causes such as:
Nerve entrapment syndromes. These include carpal tunnel syndrome, ulnar nerve palsy, peroneal nerve palsy, and radial nerve palsy.
Systemic diseases. These include kidney disorders, liver disease, vascular damage and blood diseases, amyloidosis, connective tissue disorders and chronic inflammation, hormonal imbalances (including hypothyroidism), and cancers and benign tumors that impinge on nerves.
Vitamin deficiencies. You need vitamins E, B1, B6, B12, and niacin for healthy nerves. A B12 deficiency, for example, can lead to pernicious anemia, an important cause of peripheral neuropathy. But too much B6 also can cause tingling in the hands and feet.
Alcoholism. People who have alcoholism are more likely to lack thiamine or other important vitamins because of poor dietary habits, a common cause of peripheral neuropathy. It’s also possible that alcoholism itself can cause nerve damage, a condition that some researchers call alcoholic neuropathy.
Toxins. These include heavy metals such as lead, arsenic, mercury, and thallium, and some industrial and environmental chemicals. They also include certain medications — especially chemotherapy drugs used for lung cancer — but also some antiviral and antibiotic drugs.
Infections. These include Lyme disease, shingles (varicella zoster), cytomegalovirus, Epstein-Barr, herpes simplex, and HIV and AIDS.
Autoimmune diseases. These include chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, Guillain-Barre syndrome, lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis.
Inherited disorders. These include a group that may have sensory and motor symptoms; the most common type is known as Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.
Injury. Often related to trauma, nerves can be compressed, crushed, or damaged in other ways, resulting in nerve pain. Examples include nerve compression caused by a herniated disk or dislocated bone.
Multiple sclerosis. The disease causes your body’s immune system to attack the fatty myelin sheath around nerve fibers all around your body. Tingling in the hands and feet is a common symptom.
Diagnosis of Tingling Hands and Feet
If you seek care for your tingling hands or feet, your health care provider will do a physical exam and take an extensive medical history addressing your symptoms, work environment, social habits (including alcohol use), toxic exposure, risk of HIV or other infectious diseases, and family history of neurological disease.
They also may perform other tests, such as:
- Blood tests. These can include tests to detect diabetes, vitamin deficiencies, liver or kidney dysfunction, other metabolic disorders, and signs of abnormal immune system activity.
- An examination of cerebrospinal fluid. This can identify antibodies associated with peripheral neuropathy.
- An electromyogram (EMG), a test of the electrical activity of muscle
- Nerve conduction velocity (NCV)
Other tests may include:
- Computed tomography (CT)
- Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
- Nerve biopsy
- Skin biopsy to look at nerve fiber endings
Treatments for Tingling Hands and Feet
Successful treatment depends on an accurate diagnosis and treatment of the cause of the tingling. As long as the peripheral nerve cells have not been killed, they can regenerate.
Although there are no treatments for inherited types of peripheral neuropathy, many of the acquired types can be improved with treatment. For example, good blood sugar control in diabetes can help keep diabetic neuropathy from getting worse, and vitamin supplements can correct peripheral neuropathy in people with vitamin deficiencies.
General lifestyle recommendations include keeping weight in check, avoiding exposure to toxins, following a doctor-supervised exercise program, eating a balanced diet, and avoiding or limiting alcohol. Recommendations also include quitting smoking, which constricts blood supply to blood vessels supplying nutrients to peripheral nerves.
In some cases, tingling and other symptoms of peripheral neuropathy may be eased with prescriptions developed for treating seizures and depression.
Show Sources
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke: “NINDS Paresthesia Information Page,” “Peripheral Neuropathy Fact Sheet.”
JAMA Patient Page: “Peripheral Neuropathy.”
The Neuropathy Association: “About Peripheral Neuropathy: Facts,” “Learn More About Peripheral Neuropathy,” “About Peripheral Neuropathy: Symptoms and Signs.”
The Merck Manual for Healthcare Professionals: “Peripheral Neuropathy.”
The Merck Manual of Medical Information, Second Home Edition: “Mononeuropathy,” “Polyneuropathy.”
Multiple Sclerosis Foundation: “13 Points about the Pesky Skin Sensations of Paresthesia.”
The National Multiple Sclerosis Society: “Definition of MS.”
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