Common treatments for tennis elbow or lateral epicondylalgia (LE) are frequently combined in clinical practice. The use of corticosteroid injection (CSI) to treat LE is increasingly discouraged due to the lack of long-term efficacy and due to high recurrence rates. In a randomized controlled trial with 1-year follow-up, recurrence was evident in 72% of patients receiving corticosteroid injection compared with 8% after physiotherapy.

At In Touch Hand Therapy, we have an ongoing interest in improving hand pain and function for people with OA hands, thumbs and wrists – it’s becoming an obsession!

It is common for patients to experience heightened sensitivity of the area following a hand injury or surgery.  It is thought to be the result of reduced sensory threshold to stimulus, or maladaptive central processing of incoming sensory information from the periphery. If the nerve tissues themselves are damaged, micro neuromas are another possibility (Rosen, 2012).  This hypersensitivity or hyperaesthesia may include allodynia (when pain results from stimuli which would not normally provoke pain) or hyperalgesia (an increase in sensitivity to tactile stimuli).