Things that get harder when your hands hurt, and what actually helps.
These are written by the person who makes PALM. So they say plainly when the answer is something we do not sell. A guide that only ever recommends its own author is not a guide.
If you only read one line.
Is your soap pump too stiff? The cheapest fix is a foaming dispenser with watered-down hand soap in it. About two pounds, and we do not sell them. It is one bottle, in one place, for soap, that you refill.
Can you push it, but it hurts your finger? That is a different problem, and what you want is something wider to push on. Ours clips onto a pump bottle you already own — soap, lotion, sun cream, shampoo, sanitiser — moves to another in seconds, and goes in a pocket. It comes in three shapes; if your pump is oval, or nothing like any of them, there is a made-to-measure one as well.
Different jobs. If the pump is stiff, the foaming bottle fixes it more cheaply than we can. If pressing is the problem, or you want one thing that works on every bottle in the house, that is what ours is for. All six options, compared.
These guides name other companies and other shops. We are not paid by any of them. No affiliate links, no commission, no deals.
That is on purpose. A recommendation that pays the person making it is worth less than one that does not.
Start here
- When your hands hurt: what gets harder, and what helps
Twelve everyday things that get difficult, with the cheap fix for each. Where hand pain commonly comes from, and where to get proper help — most of it free.
- When you can't feel your hands properly
Numbness is a different problem from weakness — you cannot judge how hard you are pressing. What actually gets harder, what helps, and where reduced feeling comes from. Written by someone who has it.
- How much force does a soap pump take?
I put one on a kitchen scale: about 28 newtons, and two people got within 1.3% of each other. The force belongs to the pump, not the hand — which is why “press harder” is not advice. Includes the bed of nails idea the product came from, and what is wrong with my method.
- The things we don't make
Jar openers, tap turners, kettle tippers, dressing aids. The problems we do not solve, and who does solve them in the UK. Plus two free routes almost nobody knows about. We earn nothing from any of it.
- When a child wants to wash their own hands
Setting a basin up so a toddler can do it without you — the stool, the towel, the bottle that slides, and the one item nearly every list skips. Most of the fixes are free and most of them are not mine.
Pressing things
- Pressing things without your fingers
Palm, fist, knuckle, forearm, elbow, wrist, chin, nose, foot. What each is good for, how much force it gives you, where it fails, and how to change the thing you are pressing so it works. Plus one-handed, with a splint, with long nails and with tremor.
- Your soap pump is too hard to press
Why pumps are stiff, and five things that help — ordered by what costs least and works soonest. Four of the five are not us.
- Washing your hands away from home
A friend's house, the gym, a hotel. What is worth carrying, what you will actually meet in public toilets (often easier than home), how to ask without it being a thing, and where none of it helps.
- Every way to solve a pump you can't press
Six ways to fix it, compared honestly. A wider bottle. A foaming dispenser. An easy-press bottle. A wall lever. An electric one. Or a clip-on adapter. Including where somebody else's is the better buy.
What we make, in five lines
- It is a disc. 62 mm across — about a drinks coaster — and 10.5 mm thick, or 16.5 mm for the Dome.
- It clips on and off in seconds. Onto the pump top you already have, and off again the same way. No tools, no fixing, nothing to install.
- It moves between bottles. Kitchen today, bathroom tomorrow. Buy a different brand next month and it goes on that one, as long as the top is in range.
- It goes in a bag or a pocket. So it works at a friend's house, in a hotel, at the gym — anywhere the soap is not yours.
- It does not look like equipment. It sits on the bottle you already chose, rather than replacing it with something that announces itself. Nothing on the sink has to change.
What it does not do is make the pump lighter to press — there is no lever in it. The calculation is here.
Everything else on this page is about problems we do not solve, or answers that are not ours. That is the arrangement.
The engineering
- What the mechanism actually does
The mechanical advantage is exactly 1 — no lever, no pivot, no force reduction of any kind. What changes is the pressing area. The full calculation from the CAD geometry, every figure labelled calculated, cited or measured, and a plain list of what nobody knows.
Buying something
- Buying for someone else
How to choose a present for someone with arthritis, hand pain, tremor or a limb difference that helps without landing as pity. When to ask first, what gets used, what to avoid, and how to give it well.
- Buying for yourself
What to get first, what is genuinely worth the money, and the free things to claim before you spend anything at all.
Why this site sends you to other people's products
Fair question to ask of a shop. Here is the answer in Kareem's own words.
“My objective is genuinely to help the most people I can, whether it is with my product or someone else's. I am not going to get rich from this. I am hoping I sell enough to be able to afford to make the product cheaper — more efficient production methods — and to develop more innovative and intuitive products for other problem areas.”
That is the whole business plan.
It is why the guide to a stiff pump opens by recommending a two-pound foaming dispenser we do not sell. It is why the page on everything else names other makers. And it is why our comparison page says which rivals are better, and who they are better for.
There are no affiliate links anywhere on this site. We earn nothing from any recommendation on it.
Who writes these
Kareem Chouiki, in Greenford. I design and 3D-print PALM. It is a small adapter that clips onto a soap pump so you can press it with your palm or forearm instead of a fingertip.
I made it because I could not press the pump in my own bathroom.
I designed it for my own hands and I use it every day. It is not laboratory tested or certified, and I make no medical claims for it — how I test it. My reasoning is simple: something that helps one pair of hands may help another pair with a similar difficulty, even if the reason behind it is completely different.
I am not an occupational therapist, a physiotherapist or a doctor. Where a page needs one of those, it says so and points you at them.
What I do know is the narrow end of it. I have handled a great many pump tops. I know which shapes are common and which are awkward. And I know what a pump needs before you can press it with anything other than a fingertip. That is the part worth reading these pages for.
Everything here is dated and reviewed. If something is wrong, or your own experience says otherwise, tell me. I will change it, and say that I did.
Where to get proper help, most of it free
Nothing on this website is a substitute for any of the following, and all of it is better than a website.
- A pharmacist. No appointment, no referral, and they will talk to you about hand pain and about what is worth trying. The most under-used free advice in the country.
- Your GP. Particularly if the difficulty is new, getting worse, worse in the morning, or in both hands at once.
- An occupational therapist. This is the profession whose actual job is the problem this page is about — they look at your hands and your kitchen, not at a category page. In England you can ask your council for a needs assessment for equipment and adaptations, and much of what they recommend is provided at no cost. Ask your GP, or your council's adult social care team directly.
- Arthritis UK — the charity that was Versus Arthritis until its 2026 rebrand — and NRAS both run free helplines staffed by people who know this subject properly.
- Living Made Easy, run by the Disabled Living Foundation, is an impartial database of daily-living equipment. It lists products from everyone, including our competitors and including things that would replace PALM entirely. If you want to compare options without being sold to, start there.
PALM is a daily-living aid, not a medical device. It does not treat, prevent or improve any condition, and nothing here is medical advice.