Thanks all for the discussion and good advice. I'm going to check it all out.

Mooh, Mine is a Davy Stuart with a 22" scale and a fairly deep   neck profile. I'm considering having the neck narrowed a bit because my Froggy Bottom guitar has a fairly low profile and is very comfortable. The hybrid hand position seems to be what I'm moving toward as the perpendicular position puts less strain on the joint but it is harder to stretch from there and to hammer on and pull off (for me anyway) where as my old "fiddlers postion" is bad on the pinky joint.

Graham, I would describe the pain as a mild ache that is really exacebated when I do a long stretch with the pinky. I've been playing Guitar for more than 30 years now and have been relying on my large hands to make the big stretches but I'm working on doing more position shifiing as you guys suggest.
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