Tennis elbow is a “catch-all” diagnosis for lateral or outer elbow pain. Actual tennis elbow only involves the tendons that attach to the outer elbow, and is typically localized to where those tendons meet the bone. In our practice, we’ve found that the majority of people who come in thinking they have tennis elbow actually don’t have pain coming from those tendons. They’re usually coming from a nerve that is aggravated in that same area: your radial nerve.
Tennis elbow is often over diagnosed, and it’s likely over diagnosed because:
1. Physicians and orthopedists only know how to diagnose the condition after a 5 minute exam that includes a small handful of special tests, all of which aren’t great
2. All of the tests that would normally bring on outer elbow pain in traditional tennis elbow can also bring on the same pain from a nerve related issue
3. More time and understanding of competing conditions are required to diagnose outer elbow pain more specifically and appropriately, and the way that the American healthcare system is set up (15 minute appointments with a physician or orthopedist, both of whom do not specialize in the actual treatment of these conditions) sets patients up for failure
A good physical therapist can figure out what the others have missed, but only if they know where to look and how to put all of the data points together to create a full picture of what’s going on with the patient in front of them.
Nerves don’t like compression, and they don’t like stretch. Our body compensates in fascinating ways, and this common compensation of our entire arm from a scapula that rests on a compressed rib cage is a pattern we see often. When we treat the pattern, we get a profound result in the shortest amount of time possible. When we treat the symptom without understanding the pattern, we get marginally beneficial results, if any at all.
Fix the root cause, and not just the symptom. Treating the symptom will only get you so far, if anywhere at all.
TAG a friend below who has been dealing with some pesky “tennis elbow” that just doesn’t seem to be getting better with traditional rehab. We have the answers for ya.
#elbow #elbowpain #tenniselbow #ribcage #body #better #patient #bone #nerves #pt #physicaltherapy #symptoms
19 ноя 2023