“Tennis elbow” is the term used to describe pain located on the outside of the elbow joint. The pain originates from an irritation of the tendon attachment of the wrist and finger muscles.
Who gets a tennis elbow?
Anyone can get a tennis elbow! However, most commonly, they occur in 30-50 year old’s or those with jobs that involve repetitive movements of the wrist or elbow.
How do I know if I’ve got a tennis elbow?
Aside from checking in with your local physios at Active Health, you could try the following to see if a tennis elbow may be contributing to your elbow pain;
- Position an object weighing 1-5kg in front of you at roughly waist level (ie; frying pan of food, house brick, dumbbell)
- With your arm fully out straight in front of you, and your palm facing the ground, try to pick the object up and lift it to shoulder height
If this elicits your familiar elbow pain, you may have a tennis elbow!
What do I do if I’ve got a tennis elbow??
- Don’t panic! In 90% of cases, the symptomatic tennis elbow can be settled with NON–operative treatment. This means you shouldn’t need surgery!
- Tendons need to be loaded to adapt and get better, otherwise they may remain in their painful state. Some exercises are often a good way to achieve this! Catch up with one of our physios to make sure you are given an appropriate exercise plan that is individualized to you and what your elbow needs to get better.
- Trial some self-management of the pain with any selection of the following;
- Modifying activities that hurt your elbow to prevent aggravation the pain
- Trial some basic pain relief as per packet instructions
- Wear a brace or sleeve if you have one
Extra for Experts:
- Unfortunately, this won’t be a problem that will disappear overnight. However, with an accurate diagnosis and appropriate intervention, there should be improvements to observe in your day-to-day function.
- The sooner you can “nip it in the bud”, the better! From what we know of tendon aggravations like tennis elbow, it is much easier to reverse the pain if it has only been present for a short period of time. This means the Kiwi “she’ll be right!” will not do in this case. Get onto it early!!
If you have any questions, or you are concerned about your current elbow or arm pain and want to get it sorted, get in touch with us here at Active Health and we will sort you out.
Otherwise, full steam ahead!!
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