How does pins and needles work

This can be uncomfortable or painful. Paresthesia can result from many different causes. It is often caused by nerve, spinal cord, or brain damage. It can be temporary reversible or permanent. While the nerve is squeezed, so are the arteries that feed blood to the nerve. The nerve can't work for long without a steady supply of oxygen and glucose. When the blockage is removed, the nerve cells start waking up as they start getting impulses again. You may start to have an uncomfortable pins-and-needles feeling.

The nervous system tends to become hyperactive as nerves regain normal function. If you wish to check on a problem or fault you have already reported, contact DfI Roads. The information on this page has been adapted from original content from the NHS website. For further information see terms and conditions.

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Not quite painful, but not altogether pleasant either. But if you wait a few minutes and shake out your sleepy limb, the sharp piercing nature of the sensation eventually fades away. The biology behind those pins and needles is actually quite straightforward. Putting pressure on limbs constricts blood flow, causing the tingling feeling Credit: Getty Images. There are nerves throughout your body, biological superhighways whose job is to relay information between the brain and the rest of the body.

Then, when that pressure is relieved, blood floods back into your limb and the nerves begin firing information to and from the brain. A handful of experiments in the s and s helped researchers to understand the progression of the sensation. Credit: Science Photo Library. This happens because pressure cuts off the blood supply to nerves that carry messages about sensation to the brain.

This can affect any part of the body - eg, hands, feet, face. Wearing tight shoes or sitting on your foot can give you a numb foot or leg or cause pins and needles. This kind of numbness has an obvious cause, gets better when the pressure is removed and doesn't cause any further problems.

Numbness or pins and needles can also be due to a trapped nerve. A slipped disc or back problem can put pressure on a nerve that travels from your back, down your leg and into your toes. A trapped nerve in the neck can also cause numbness or pins and needles anywhere from your neck, down your arms and into your fingers. Carpal tunnel syndrome is a trapped nerve at the wrist , giving you pins and needles and pain in the hand and loss of grip.

Other examples are thoracic outlet syndrome and spinal stenosis. Diabetes can damage small blood vessels that supply nerves in fingers and toes. This can cause pins and needles, pain or numbness in the hands and feet peripheral neuropathy.

Being unable to feel anything in your hands and feet can be dangerous, as you may stumble, drop things or not realise when you are touching something hot. Damage to nerve endings in fingers or toes can be the result of an injury. People who use vibrating tools a lot may also develop nerve damage and may experience pins and needles. Some medicines can cause nerve damage. It is usually reversible when the medicine is stopped.