Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
If you're a driven,
active person who wants to reach
and pursue a higher qualitylife with some ambition, then
guess what this podcast is foryou.
This is the Driven AthletePodcast.
What's up y'all?
It's your man, dr Kyle.
This is the Driven AthletePodcast.
Welcome back.
Today we're going to pinpointtalk about tennis elbow.
(00:20):
Okay, elbow pain, lateral elbowpain, lateral epicondylitis,
lateral epicondylopathy, lateralepicondylosis those are all
really mean the same thing andit's tennis elbow is the old
head version diagnosis that wehear a lot.
But the tennis elbow is areally common thing.
We see people, right, becausewe work with a lot of golfers,
(00:42):
tennis players and upperextremity arm-based athletes,
people that exercise a lot.
So it's actually a common thing, right?
So I wanted to shed some lighton what exactly is tennis elbow.
All right, the medical term islateral epicondylitis or lateral
epicondylopathy or lateralepicondylosis.
All right, the lateralepicondyle is a bony structure
(01:05):
on the outside of your humerusbone and you have a plethora, a
handful of muscles that allconnect to that one origination
point on your lateral epicondyleof your humerus and it all
inserts something called yourcommon extensor tendon.
All right, so you have a bunchof muscles that all connect
through your common extensortendon right onto your lateral
epicondyle of your humerus andcommon extensor tendon.
So you have a bunch of musclesthat all connect through your
common extensor tendon rightonto your lateral epicondyle of
(01:26):
your humerus and when that getslit up and involved, we call it
lateral epicondylitis.
All right, itis meaninginflammation, epicondylosis,
osis just means like a chronicproblem and degenerative changes
.
It's like a degenerative,chronic problem, opathy, like
tendinopathy.
Lateral epicondylopathy thatjust means that there is a
(01:47):
pathology of that structure, ofthat region.
All right, so probably the mostaccurate term.
It's just semantics but wouldbe maybe like lateral
epicondylopathy.
There is a problem going onthere, super acute, we would
call it epicondylitis.
So the common extensor tendonis the structure that a lot of
muscles connect right under thelateral epicondyle of your
humerus.
(02:08):
Okay, knowing that from ourprevious conversations, things
don't hurt for no reason andthings don't get lit up for no
reasons, and the structures thatare lit up and painful are
usually the victims becausethey're overwhelmed and they're
trying to overcompensate andthey're working overtime because
other structures aren'tcontributing enough or there's
compensation patterns going on.
(02:28):
It's a combination of the twomobility disparities and muscle
strength, activation disparities, followed with compensation
patterns.
Those things lead tocompensation patterns right so
we can fix those mobilitydisparities and muscle strength
activation disparities and thentranslate that into your sport
and movement to fix thecompensation pattern right.
So with lateral epicondyle pain, lateral epicondylopathy,
(02:51):
tennis elbow, we know that thecommon extensor tendon and the
research, the most commonlyreported structure that's lit up
is the extensor carpi radialisbrevis tendon.
The extensor carpi radialisbrevis tendon seems to be the
one that's the most commonlyresearched.
That's lit up right as itinserts through your common
(03:11):
extensor tendon on your lateralepicondyle so it gets really
tended to touch right on theoutside of your elbow bone right
there, and that's a reallycommon thing.
So as sports physical therapyclinicians we're thinking why is
that tendon all lit up?
What's the cause of that cause?
Because things don't hurt forno reason and it's a victim, not
(03:33):
the problem.
We can intervene there withsome soft tissue, maybe dry
needling, to stimulate a healingresponse and stimulate a pain
modulation response and recruitendogenous opioids, maybe
stimulate collagen fiberangiogenesis and create more
fiber development withfibroblast activity.
(03:54):
That's what the researchsuggests with dry needling.
That's all we're going toreally do to intervene at that
site.
But we have to interveneelsewhere and investigate why
the heck is this extensor carpiradialis brevis tendon getting
all lit up like this right Righton the insertion point on your
lateral condyle, why there hasto be something else being done,
some compensation patterns.
So we have to investigate andwhat we're finding for sports,
(04:18):
upper body sports.
It seems like there's a linkwith the scapula, the shoulder
blade link.
We have to investigate theshoulder joint and the shoulder
blade as to why, maybe distallydown the chain, the elbow is
overcompensating for stuff likegolf and tennis, especially
lacrosse, racket sports andstick sports like hockey, and
(04:39):
then exercise, pull-ups,grasping, rowing, lifting
activities.
Of course there seems to be alink in the scapula that's
making the elbow have toovercompensate.
Elbow and wrist isovercompensating because of a
lack of mobility in the scapulaor stability and strength.
So that's what we have toinvestigate and intervene.
Other things that relates torotational sports.
So we can also intervene likethoracic spine rotation, either
(05:02):
rotation extension or flexionrotation of the thoracic spine.
We have to check that out.
The ribs, as they relate to thethoracic spine for rotation
range of motion available that alack thereof is going to make
something else compensate.
That's where that link comes in.
We had to investigate that.
So we're going to us as sportsphysical therapy clinicians and
we do stuff like thoracicrotation exercises.
(05:23):
It's like, well, but my elbowhurts.
Why aren't you working on myelbow?
It's like dude for golf ortennis or lacrosse, like your
rotation requirements.
You're limited going to thatside with your threat and
rotation.
Your T-spine plays a major rolewith that and it's limited we
can intervene there.
Right, that's what we're doing,that stuff.
We're also checking out yourscapula too.
It's like why are you doingmanual therapy and intervening
on my scapula?
(05:43):
There's a link correlated witha lack of scapular stability,
mobility, to elbow issues andelbow pain and we wouldn't be
doing our job if we didn'tinvestigate elsewhere,
proximally or distally.
Does that make sense?
So that's why we check thatstuff out.
Okay, in the research they callit a recalcitrant tendon problem
or tendinitis or tendinosis.
(06:04):
Recalcitrant, being stubbornand not following expected uh,
prop progress and and and uhpolicies.
Right, it's like a recalcitrantteenager.
In school they would call thislike a recalcitrant.
A recalcitrant um tendinopathyproblem.
It's like not following normalprotocol.
What the heck?
Why isn't it getting better Ifwe're not fixing the
(06:25):
compensation patterns that ledto it in the first place?
And they continue to do theirsport or their activity.
It's not going to get better,it's just going to continue to
compensate right, and it's goingto get continually overwhelmed.
And if we don't interveneappropriately with this kind of
a rationale and clinicalapproach, what do you think is
going to happen?
Like, what's that road lead to?
Usually the suggestions aremore meds pain meds Advil would
(06:49):
be like a lower version of thatbut pain meds, injection,
steroid injection, which aren'treally super helpful, that when
the research is finding andeffective for elbow issues, and
then a debridement surgery right, if anything.
I'm like man, maybe that's juststuff that helps prevent people
from like yo, this modifyappropriately.
(07:09):
Right now it lets things settledown and then they get back
into this doing it and it comesback.
So it's like this constantcycle of like three months of
like resting and then three totwo months of like doing their
thing and then it comes backagain and then they get another
injection and they rest and itfeels better and then they go
back and it hurts again and thenit's continually fluctuate back
and forth.
(07:30):
We see that pretty often and wehear that stuff and we're like
no, if we can intervene and stopthat cycle and fix why it's
happening in the first placebecause there is a solution,
knowing that things don't hurtfor no reason.
Then we can stop that cycle.
All right, and that's why we'rejust passionate and live
vicariously through our patientsCause we've been there, our
clinicians and our practice.
We see ourselves in thepatients we work with as in like
(07:51):
yo.
There is a better solution,there is a way to life.
Dude, we're trying to help youas best we can and we can't stop
that cycle.
We just have to interveneappropriately.
First things first we got toinvestigate and evaluate, see
what the heck is going on andwhy, and then we can intervene
appropriately.
Does that make sense?
So we can definitely avoid thatcycle of meds, injections and
surgery for something like atendinopathy problem, because we
(08:14):
know that things don't hurt forno reason.
It's just compensating, right.
As long as you rule outunderlying red flags and
systemic problems that mightlimit healing progressions or
underlying visceral systemicissue that's causing pain of
some sort, then we know it'sneuromusculoskeletal, which
means we can interveneappropriately.
So dry needling.
So people ask this what would wedo to help with lateral
(08:36):
epicondylopathy, epicondylitis,epicondylosis, whatever?
Tennis elbow?
What can we do to helpintervene?
Here's our typical progressionthat we investigate.
We have to look at the radialhead mobility.
The radius is one of the bonesin your forearm, your ulna is
the other one.
The radial head is really closeto the attachment point of your
lateral epicondyle.
It actually connectsarticulates with that surface at
(08:58):
the capitulum and the fovea ofyour radial head.
So the radial head mobility isreally important, has a close
relationship to that lateralepicondyle and the tendons that
go across that articulation.
So if the radial head is stiffand stuck and not really moving
well, then we need to intervenethere.
So manually we can intervene atthe radius, at the radial head,
to improve that range of motionand mobility.
Okay, and joint play.
(09:19):
Then we can also do soft tissue,of course, on the extensor
carpi, radialis brevis tendonand the common extensor tendon
we can drive with cupping,stripping, grasping, whatever.
I'm not a huge fan of graspingfor stuff like this because
compression and scrapingsomething that's already lit up,
I'm like man.
There might be a better avenueto help involve and influence
the soft tissue, um pliabilityand healing potential.
(09:41):
But anyway, um, cupping I'm ahuge fan of.
And then, uh, dry needling.
So dry needling has um somereally good evidence and
research to help with, uh, withproblematic and chronic
tendinopathy issues and some ofthe rationale behind it is it
helps to stimulate a healingresponse.
It helps to stimulatefibroblast activity to lay down
(10:04):
new collagen tissue.
So imagine something that'slike degenerative and chronic an
issue.
It's more degenerating of thetendon.
If we can stimulate a betterhealing response and maybe
laying down new collagen fibersin the tendon or the muscular
tendon disjunction, that canhelp.
It can help lay down newangiogenesis of capillaries and
then also pain modulation.
All right.
And then we have to look at thewrist.
(10:25):
We can work on wrist extension,mobility as it relates and the
scaphoid and, uh, the lunateseem to be a big influence with
wrist mobility and do extensionand and and rotation, supination
or pronation, um.
And then again we have to checkout the scapula.
We have to check out yourscapula.
We can usually intervene withupward rotation or protraction
exercises and get the stabilityof those muscles to activate
(10:48):
better.
If there's any glenohumeralinstability in the shoulder
joint, we're going to fix that.
And then the rotationalcomponents of your sport.
We can't neglect that andthat's where the T-spine comes
in.
So put yourself in the positionthat's necessary to make other
things, not have to compensateto make up for it.
So that's usually what we do tointervene All right Wrist
mobility as appropriate, softtissue, dry needling, radial
head mobility, scapular mobilityand strength activation,
(11:10):
stability exercises and then theT-spine, and because we know
that all those things arerequired for an upper body sport
that has rotation lacrosse,volleyball, weightlifting
exercises, golf and tennis, ofcourse.
So if you have any questions,you have battling elbow pain.
We would love to talk with youand investigate a little bit
(11:32):
more.
Like I said, we're passionateabout what we do because we live
vicariously through ourpatients, that we see ourselves
in them and the hampered,limited things that have just
limited our pain activityactivity from pain.
But we can intervene there.
Right, there is a reason whythings hurt.
They don't hurt for no reason,and that also means that there's
a solution and we can work onthis stuff.
So we would love to talk withyou and chat more about maybe
(11:53):
how we can intervene for youspecifically and get you back to
doing the stuff that you lovein your sport, that finally we
can solve this problem that'sbeen going on forever.
We would love to help and helpintervene as best we can.
We would love to help and helpintervene as best we can, so
don't hesitate to reach out.
You can call us at 561-899-8725or shoot us an email at team at
athlete rccom.
(12:14):
That's T-A-A-M at athlete rccom.
So we're looking forward tochatting with you and, like I
said, don't hesitate to reachout.
We'll catch y'all next time.
Hey, hold up.
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(12:35):
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