At 44 years old I don't think of myself as old, especially considering that I use a mountain bike to get around here in Alaska, but a few of my finger joints do hurt, especially when I type a lot. Some combination of a lot of sports when I was young and a lot of typing these days (and maybe a little DNA) has led to finger joint pain. I've looked into soft-touch keyboards for people with arthritis, but haven't had much success (other than very expensive solutions). The best solution seems to be using my MacBook Pro, which has a nice, soft keyboard.

I'm not one to endorse products, but I wouldn't be typing on days like today if it weren't for Osteo Bi-Flex. It really seems to help reduce the pain a lot, and based on my own survey doctors and pharmacists endorse it. They say it helps to lubricate the joints, where just about anything else you can buy just masks the pain.

The only problem with Osteo Bi-Flex is that there doesn't seem to be a long-lasting effect -- a few days after you quit taking the pills the normal pain returns, so unless something else comes around I'll be taking four of these pills every day until I croak. (Hmm, I wonder if their stock is publicly traded...) Also, Osteo Bi-Flex doesn't work overnight, it seems to take a few days to kick in.

If you have a similar problem and the Osteo Bi-Flex doesn't help enough I'd then recommend some form of capsaicin creme. I've used a product named Capzasin. It burns like crazy the first time you use it, but then it calms down after that. I've found overnight relief with capsaicin creme, but it just masks the pain, which I don't like in the long-term. As they write on this page, "Capsaicin topical causes a decrease in a substance in the body (substance P) that causes pain".