The warmer season is here! Best time to enjoy outdoor activities like tennis, climbing, or even painting the garden fence. Unfortunately, sometimes a combination of poor physical preparation, overzealous repetitive movements or overload can spoil the fun. The result is Tennis Elbow, an annoying and sometimes debilitating pain in the outside of the elbow. We might just wait until it gets better but it can take several months to improve.
Here is some more information about this annoying condition and what swissphysio can do to help.
Tennis Elbow: What is it?
While the common name “tennis elbow” suggests a strong link to racket sports, this condition is most commonly seen in two groups of people:
Manual Laborers
People who work with their hands are at greater risk of developing lateral elbow pain. Jobs that may lead to tennis elbow include plumbers, painters, gardeners, waiters, carpenters and even musicians like guitar players.
Sports Participants
Sports participants, especially racket sport players, are prone to developing tennis elbow. In addition to racket sports, this conditionis seen in golfers, fencers, swimmers and climbers to mention
Symptoms
- Pain over the outside of the elbow (lateral epicondyle)
- Tenderness when lifting objects and cocking back the wrist
- Pain from gripping and grasping objects and movements of the wrist
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Causes of Tennis Elbow
Tennis elbow is an overuse injury. The pain associated with this condition usually has a gradual onset. Sometimes may also come on suddenly as a consequence of a trauma.
In some cases the causes of the problem can stem from the shoulder and/or the neck. The onset of tennis elbow can be the result of a combination of various factors like: more
Prevention
- Gradually increase the intensity of activity.
- Make sure your working station is well assessed and take enough breaks during a repetitive task.
- Warm up before sport, DIY and painting jobs https://swissphysio.co.uk/videos/pain-free-diy-part-1-warming-up-routine/ and cool down https://swissphysio.co.uk/videos/pain-free-diy-part-2-cooling-down-routine/
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Treatment
Treatments given atswissphysio always aim to solve the problems from the root. For this reason an experienced chartered physiotherapist or/and qualified TCM acupuncturist will first thoroughly assess you. They will focus not only on your elbow but also the whole body. This will include read more