I hope you are enjoying these TOP physiotherapy – Olney blogs and could put into practice some of those hints and tips I wrote regarding sciatica during the last post. I understand sciatica can make you feel exhausted, dejected and un-motivated. If the hints and tips did not help, do not give up hope, there is much more we can do. Please get in touch and we can talk through how we could help.
Today I am going to write a really short, concise blog about tennis elbow, the most common elbow condition I see in the Olney clinic. Before you think, “I don’t play tennis, so this blog isn’t for me”, I see far more people with this condition who haven’t picked up a tennis racket in their lives than those who have. You can get tennis elbow having never played tennis in your life! If you have pain on the outside aspect of your elbow, you most likely have tennis elbow and even better it is a condition you can diagnose yourself!
The technical word for tennis elbow is lateral epicondyalgia, which translates into lateral (outside) elbow pain. The condition is caused by overloading the tendons on the lateral elbow which help to move your wrist and fingers. Some common activities which use these muscles are; typing on a keyboard, using manual tools (DIY), racket sports and weightlifting in the gym. Please note this is not a finite list, there can be many other causes.
Tennis elbow is easy to diagnose, if you have pain during resisted wrist extension, then there is a good chance you have tennis elbow. This is a test you can try at home - give it a go:
Like all tendinopathy’s, they are caused by overloading the tendon which is commonly due to the sport or occupation someone does. Don't worry - these tendons can be fixed! The crucial thing to do when trying to recover from tennis elbow is managing how much load (force) goes through the tendon. So, if you carry on doing what you are doing it will only get worse, as the forces that you are putting through the tendon are too much. Most interestingly though, unlike what some people say, complete rest would be no good either as that would not strengthen the tendon enough and it can last even longer. So how do you fix it, I hear you ask?
Well this is where a physio comes in handy. At TOP Physiotherapy we would not only design you a perfectly balanced program, that is not too easy or too hard but is just right to help heal that tendon – The goldilocks program if you will. It’s not just about exercise however, we will also do the hands-on treatment you need including; dry needling, soft tissue massage, muscle energy techniques and more. All these techniques will give you the pain relief you need to carry on most of your day to day tasks – pain free! Like most things though, we don’t claim to be able to completely fix things without your help – you would have to do a few exercises for us too!
If you are having elbow pain and after reading this blog, you think you might have tennis elbow then please get in touch – We can help!
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