Tennis elbow in primary care

doi:10.1136/bmj.39017.396389.BE

BMJ 2006;333:927-928 (4 November), doi:10.1136/bmj.39017.396389.BE

Editorial

Tennis elbow in primary care

Corticosteroid injections provide only short term pain relief

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Tennis elbow or lateral humeral epicondylitis is consideredto be an overload injury, which occurs after minor and oftenunrecognised trauma (microtrauma) to the proximal insertionof the extensor muscles of the forearm. The pathological changesoften occur in the tendon of the extensor carpi radialis brevismuscle. The annual incidence of tennis elbow in general practiceis four to seven cases per 1000 patients, with a peak in patients35-54 years of age. Lateral epicondylitis is a self limitingcondition. The average duration of a typical episode is aboutsix months to two years, but most patients (89%) recover withinone year.¹ Various conservative interventions exist for thetreatment of this condition including pain relieving drugs,corticosteroid injections, physiotherapy, elbow supports, acupuncture,surgery, and shockwave therapy. However, available evidencefor the effectiveness of these interventions is limited.²

In this week's BMJ a randomised controlled trial by Bisset and. . . [Full text of this article]

Nynke Smidt, clinical epidemiologist

MRC Health Services Research Collaboration, Department of Social Medicine, Bristol BS8 2PR
(n.smidt@amc.uva.nl)

Danielle AWM van der Windt, reader in general practice epidemiology

Primary Care Science Research Centre, Keele University, Keele, Staffordshire ST5 5BG

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