Hawkes Physiotherapy Blog

The body is complicated and just because pain is felt in a particular area doesn't actually mean that this is where the pain is coming from. Firstly you don't have to have neck pain for it to be coming from your neck: "Cervical radiculopathy may or may not be associated with neck pain (Caridi et a 2011)." For example Golfer's elbow: In a study by Lee & Robinson (2010) they had fifty-five patients that were diagnosed with medial epicondylitis (Golfer's elbow). Of these, 44 had C6 and C7 radiculopathy whereas, 11 presented with just C6 radiculopathy. What this means is that either the Radiculopathy was mimicking the Golfer's elbow or it created a neurological weakness thereby causing the Golfer's elbow to develop. Bottom line is that you need to treat the neck and if you just treat the elbow you are barking up the wrong tree! It's the same problem with Tennis elbow too: This study  indicates that lateral epicondylitis symptoms...

Today it is still common place for Tennis elbow to get stuck with a steroid injection. Just the other day I saw somebody who'd had several done and each time the effect was shorter and shorter. My head was in my hands. Why? Firstly, Tennis elbow is a Tendinopathy which essentially means it is a pathology of the tendon. The reason that they call it this, is because Tendinitis basically means inflammation of tendon and the current thoughts are that it is not an inflammatory problem: Stanton (2012) describes Lateral epicondylitis (Tennis elbow) as tendinosis of the origin of Extensor Carpi Radialis Brevis (ECRB) tendon & is not an inflammatory process. The fact is that Corticosteroids are mainly used to reduce inflammation and suppress the immune system according to the NHS website. So at best for this type of condition they would be barking up the wrong tree and ineffective. Not to mention that inflammation is needed to heal the tendon so taking it away doesn'...