A GIRL aged 8 is suffering from repetitive strain injury after sending too many text messages on her mobile phone.

Isabelle Taylor injured herself by spending too long every day texting her friends. The girl, from Lytham St Anne’s, Lancashire, said that she first noticed pain in her wrists, which then spread to her fingers.

She is being treated by David Cosgrave, a chiropractor, who said that the condition, known formally as tendiopathy, was surprisingly common among children who use high-tech gadgets.

“I reckon I see two cases a month,” he said. “A lot of youngsters who play their PlayStations or use their phones a lot can suffer inflammation that can be painful in the upper arms and wrists.

“Text messaging regularly, over a long period of time, could cause repetitive strain, which is causing both short- and long-term injuries. Many times the pains are put down to growing pains, when actually there is something else causing it.”

Text messaging is a part of everyday life for most schoolchildren — four out of five own a mobile phone by the time they are 11 — and in 2004 there were 79 million texts sent on the day that GCSE results were published.

The Mobile Data Association predicts that 36.5 billion text messages will be sent this year, and a survey for Virgin Mobile this year suggested that 3.8 million Britons now complain of texting-related pain.

The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy is so concerned about the phenomenon that it published a guide for phone users giving warning about “text message injury”.

Bronwyn Clifford, a physiotherapist who worked on the guide, said: “As mobile phone technology develops, handsets are getting smaller with buttons closer together. The small, definite, repetitive movements used to manoeuvre controls on these tiny handsets can begin to cause pain over time.”

Mr Cosgrave added: “When you are text messaging, you tend to hold your shoulders and upper arms tense.

“This cuts down the circulation to the forearm, when, in fact, it needs a greater than normal blood flow to achieve the fine movements of the thumbs and fingers.”

Other electronic devices, such as MP3 players, games consoles and personal electronic organisers have also been known to cause repetitive strain injury, a condition that is best treated by rest and simple exercises for the affected muscles. The British Chiropractic Association recommends that frequent texters practise spreading their fingers and then making fists, as well as stretching the neck muscles and wrists, to avoid developing injuries.

Mr Cosgrave said that Isabelle was making a good recovery — and is determined to carry on texting.

Australian researchers conducting a study into mobile phone addiction said preliminary findings suggested that many students became anxious and agitated if they were parted from their mobiles. Diana James, of Queensland University of Technology, said that some students in the trial suffered sleep depri- vation and repetitive strain injury from staying up late at night texting.

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