elbow tendonitis

[andrewT]

For some odd reason lately when I do skullcrushers, overhead dumbell presses or close grip bench I get major tingling in my tendon that passes over my left elbow. It is getting quite annoying and it has never happened to me before

any ways to prevent this from happening? I know this is quite common but I am only 21 and this is getting irritated from fairly light weights.

any help is appreciated.

[tiramisu]

There's nothing odd about elbow pain and skull crushers. Once your elbow tendons get inflamed you are just making them worse by continuing to beat on them.

Preventing tendonitis from skull crushers requires that you be darn careful with them. They put a lot of torque on the elbows. Another easier option is to simply drop them and replace them with a far more useful compound exercise...

J-Press, Reverse Grip bench, narrow bench, dips. You've go options.

[St]

Ya go with another exercise,its is bad on the elbows.Ice the shit out of them at 16 minutes max per session,but as many times as you like.

[Sexxxton]

Tiramisu -- guys here are using voltaren inject: is this better than cortisone?

[tiramisu]

I have absolutely no idea what a volteren is. Sounds like a stun gun.

I looked it up and it's not a stun gun. NSAID. My experience with NSAIDS for tendonitis is limited to naproxen sodium. The doctor at the local sports clinic has prescribed it to me on a few occasions over the years. Now that it's available OTC I just buy Aleve and self-medicate. BUT this is in combination with rest, ice, compression, elevation, mobility work, pain free exercise, ruba535, massage, and more ice.

Tendonitis is a royal pain in the ass once it becomes chronic. If you back off in the first couple of days it's clear in a couple of weeks. If you try to exercise through it then you've got 12-16 weeks of aggressive and consistent therapy to get it cleared up.

Cortisone is a generally bad idea for athletes as it will weaken the tendon it is injected into to. If it's a choice between surgery and cortisone, I'd pick cortisone but as a choice between rehab and cortisone the choice should pretty much always be rehab.

... AND all of this presumes that you actually have tendonitis. You need to be sure of the diagnosis before you start self treatment. If you aren't sure get thee to a clinic with doctors who treat athletes, it's well worth the extra mileage to go to see someone who is used to dealing with these kind of injuries. In Winnipeg that was always the Pan Am clinic and since they bought their own MRI I'm guessing it still is.

If you don't know how to manually treat the injury yourself, ask your hockey/football friends/coaches who a real therapist is. Most phyiso's are useless but a special few are worth their weight in gold because they have spent plenty of time working with athletes that need to get strong rather than simply getting to the absence of pain.

.... that's a lot of words but theirs no silver bullets and it's not a matter of picking one drug over the other (I wish)

[Praetorian]

As T said avoid cortisone if you value your tendons. Stop doing skull crushers now and let the tendons get some relief.
Do the following daily:

1. Ice the elbows 20min on 10 min off multiple time daily
2. Use Advil 600mg before bed (limited time-week to 10 days)
3. Get Pennsaid and use it multiple times daily
4. Rest them-stop triceps training for a week or so....then start back light and avoid skull crushers

P

[tiramisu]

Interesting on the Pennsaid - topical diclofenac. Is this one OTC? I'm not a NSAIDS fan in general as it seems like they aren't all that effective in getting to where the blood flow is poor. I use the naproxen when there's a nagging ache and it has a significant effect but otherwise I'm an ice junky for self induced flare ups. (massage, stretch, exercise). Does the topical diclofenac work more effectively on the tendon it is applied to in your experience? I can eat ibuprophen till it burns a hole in my stomach and it does nothing for my tendons.

[Praetorian]

Interesting on the Pennsaid - topical diclofenac. Is this one OTC? I'm not a NSAIDS fan in general as it seems like they aren't all that effective in getting to where the blood flow is poor. I use the naproxen when there's a nagging ache and it has a significant effect but otherwise I'm an ice junky for self induced flare ups. (massage, stretch, exercise). Does the topical diclofenac work more effectively on the tendon it is applied to in your experience? I can eat ibuprophen till it burns a hole in my stomach and it does nothing for my tendons.

Pennsaid is a topical anti-inflammatory...it was originally designed for people with arthritic knees....but has now graduated to being used on all kinds of tendon inflammation.
Its not OTC but most Dr's at a walk in will prescribe it if you ask.
P

[natenator]

Pennsaid is a topical anti-inflammatory...it was originally designed for people with arthritic knees....but has now graduated to being used on all kinds of tendon inflammation.
Its not OTC but most Dr's at a walk in will prescribe it if you ask.
P

I couldn't get one ****tard DR here in Ottawa last year to prescribe it to me so I had to go the alternative route voltaren as you had suggested which helped but I think not as well as pennsaid would have.