Matt Lewington from Enhance Physiotherapy Albury Wodonga speaking about tendon pain and how to best treat tendons to get you back achieving your goals faster!
Whether it be your achilles, patella tendon, lateral hip, shoulder or elbow – tendon pain can be very debilitating when it comes to achieving your goals and participating in your every day activities.
In the last 2 weeks I have treated 12 new patients who have presented to our clinic with tendon pain! Some have recently started back exercises after a month off at the end of football and netball season, others had increased their loading coming into the Melbourne Marathon while some had just simply increased their daily activity with the nicer spring weather that is upon us.
There are 3 Key Points when in comes to tendon pain:
- Pain = Overloading
when you are experiencing pain in your tendon it is your tendons way of telling you that it is overloaded and that is requires some ”relative rest”. This is most common with high intensity, dynamic activities such as running, jumping and throwing.
2. We need to continue loading your tendon
it is important to continue loading your tendon. If you rest from activity your tendon will feel better and your pain will decrease, however, your tendon’s tolerance to load will also decrease. When you return to doing your previous activities your pain will return, often worse than it was previously due to the deconditioning of your tendon from being unloaded.
3. Tendons don’t respond well to stretching and massage
when you experience pain and tightness that is associated with tendon pain it is very common to try stretching the tendon or getting a massage to help with your symptoms. Tendons are very different to muscles and do not respond well to stretching or massage – these strategies can actually make your tendon pain worse!
If you are experiencing tendon pain, or want to know more about how to get the best results for you so you can achieve your goals faster book in now through our online booking portal on our website or Facebook or call our clinic on 6041 3609.
