Tendinitis is a discomfort of the tendon. It results in pain outside the joint. There are many tendons in the body, but this condition is mainly witnessed in wrists, heels, shoulders and elbows. Some frequently used names for different kinds of tendinitis includes pitcher’s shoulder, tennis elbow, jumper’s knee, golfer’s elbow and swimmer’s shoulder.

Symptoms of tendinitis:

Symptoms of tendinitis are witnessed at the point of contact between bone and the muscle. Some of the signs of tendinitis are tenderness, swelling and a dull ache while moving the affected joint. Even constant pain can be felt in some cases.

What are the causes of tendinitis?

Tendinitis is frequently observed among athletes. If a job involves repetitive motion of a particular joint, the stress on the tendons can result in tendinitis. It is therefore very important for athletes to use the right technique in order to refrain from tendon related problems. Trauma can also result in an injury to the tendon.

Risk factor of tendinitis:

Risk factors for this condition include job, occupation, and sports. As a person gets older, tendons tend to lose their flexibility, which can lead to an injury of the tendon. If the job of a person involves frequent reaching of the overhead, vibration, repetitive motion and forceful exertion, he might face an injury to the tendon resulting in tendinitis. Last but not the least, tendinitis is very common among players who are involved in sports such as basketball, tennis, golf, baseball, running, cricket and bowling.

What are the complications involved?

Tendinitis can aggravate to tendon rupture of proper treatment is not done on time. Tendon rupture needs a surgical procedure to fix. If tendon pain lasts for few weeks at stretch, there is a good chance that the condition has turned into tendinitis.

Diagnosis:

Diagnosis of tendinitis can be done with the physical exam itself. A doctor might want to look at an X-ray scan to negate other condition that might be causing the pain.

Treatment:

Treatment includes the prescription of pain relievers. Topical creams can also be prescribed to relieve the pain. Doctors often suggest corticosteroids be injected along the tendon in order to relieve tendinitis. If the condition is not very serious, a doctor might suggest specific exercise such as eccentric strengthening to fix the condition.

If the condition is severe, the doctor might want to go for a surgical procedure to fix tendinitis. Especially in conditions where there is a tear in the tendon. Another invasive technique to treat tendinitis is the needling of scar tissue. This procedure is performed under anesthesia thereby causing less pain to the patient.

If you are about to undergo a knee replacement surgery, it is important to know the extent of pain that it involves, and the recovery period that follows. A knee replacement surgery is a major surgery, and a patient needs time to adjust to the replacement of his/her knee. The time of recovery depends on the patient.

The steps of recovery after a knee replacement surgery are as follows:

After surgery

Recovery at home

• It is normal for you to feel tired and fatigued at home in the beginning. A knee replacement surgery is a major surgery, and the tissues and muscles around your knee require time to heal properly.
• You should arrange for a person who would help you while you go out for a few weeks after the surgery.
• It is very important for you to practice the exercises prescribed by your physiotherapist. This is a vital part of speedy recovery and you should not avoid them.
• You should be able to stop depending on crutches or walking frames and go back to your regular activities and schedule in approximately six weeks after the surgery.

The recovery process usually continues for about a year after undergoing the surgery. During this period, scar tissue heals and your muscles get restored through exercises. It is recommended for you to avoid any kind of extreme sports or movements in which there is a risk of falling.

COMMON QUESTIONS ANSWERED

Heel pain is one of the commonest conditions for which patient visits doctor especially orthopedic surgeons. There are various causes for this and the most common condition is:

PLANTAR FASCITIS

This is basically swelling of a thick layer of soft tissue under the sole of the foot, which spreads to entire foot starting from the underside of the heel. This occurs commonly because of overuse and seen in the population who stand for long durations like teachers, policemen, athletes, improper footwear. This can increase in intensity in cases with weak bones like vitamin D deficiency, high uric acid levels, low thyroid level patients etc. Rarely this can arise from nerve entrapment. 

The other heel pain condition is back-sided heel pain, which is commonly referred to as:

ACHILLES TENDINITIS

This also is an overuse injury caused by the pull of one tough muscle attachment to the bone called ACHILLES. Causes will be from bony bump over the heel bone called HAGLUND DEFORMITY. More or less the other causes remain the same as described in the earlier paragraphs.

One should always be confident that these are common conditions and definitely treatable. Most of them can be managed by non-operative means like the modification of footwear like:

• Custom Insoles
• Silicone Heel Cups
• Insoles
• Also some exercises, which include plantar fascia stretching, calf stretching.

If the pain is not coming down injections are given which include steroid+local anaesthetic or stem cell injections like PLATELET-RICH PLASMA are also being administered with high success rate. 

Surgical intervention is very rare especially in plantar fasciitis, rarely in less than 1% may need calf muscle release for reducing the tight heel cord muscle. Surgery is done for backside heel pain with a bump over it when the heel cord (ACHILLES) is torn or weak where the bone bump is removed and heel cord is reattached to the bone.

Following the doctor orders and systematically treated by trained doctors will relieve the patient problem.