Elbow Pain
Recently we have treated a few cases of elbow pain.
There are two common site for elbow pain, the outside edge of the elbow which is often an indication of tennis elbow or lateral epicondylitis and the inside edge of the elbow which is often an indication of glofer’s elbow or medial epicondylitis. With both of these conditions the pain may radiate up the arm and / or down along the forearm.
Both conditions can be caused by precise wrist movements from using a mouse or keyboard. As the name suggests tennis elbow can be caused by faulty backhand technique when playing tennis. While golfer’s elbow can be caused by poor technique when playing Golf or faulty forehand technique when playing tennis.
In addition tennis elbow can be caused by carrying heavy shopping bags as it causes tension in the wrist extensors.
Most of the cases we see are caused by long hours using computers. The first thing we do is try and establish the cause of the pain, which can be tightness or spasm in the muscles of the forearm, neck or shoulders and then treat accordingly. We can also show you simple stretches to stretch out the muscles of the forearm.
What surprised us, and prompted me to write this blog is that they all the clients had just assumed that elbow pain was something that they just had to lived with. In all the cases we dramatically reduced the pain and in most cases after a few treatments the clients were pain free! So don’t sit their in pain, book a massage.
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Is the way you breathing causing your neck pain? – Part 1
If you have had a treatment with us, we may have talked to you about importance of deep breathing, if you have tension in your neck. Shallow breathing, thoracic breathing, or chest breathing is the drawing of minimal breath into the lungs, usually by drawing air into the chest area using accessory muscles rather than throughout the lungs via the diaphragm. This means that you over use some of the accessory muscles of breathing, including the scalenes and sternocleidomastoid muscles both of which are located in the side of the neck. The scalenes elevate the 1st rib during inspiration and the sternocleidomastoid raises the sternum. Unfortunately, these accessory muscles aren’t built for routine respiration, and they exhaust and eventually injure themselves which may result in pain and/or a reduced range of movement (i.e. inability to turn your head fully from side to side). People shallow breath when they are nervous, stressed, anxious, or when they concentrate. So simply stopping and taking one deep breath after you send each email, can reduce the over use of your scalenes and sternocleidomastoid.
How to increase the chances of a natural birth…
Interventions during labour and childbirth are on the rise but a large proportion of pregnant women would like a natural birth but are concerned about pain relief. Against this back drop, a recent randomised control trial looked at the effectiveness of a two day birth preparation course in supporting natural birth. The birth preparation course attended by both the pregnant women and their birthing partners, covered the standard medical advice and self-administered complementary therapies including
- visualisation, breathing, massage and yoga to enhance relaxation
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- breathing, yoga and acupressure to aid pain relief
Trigger Points
Often clients sit down to have a massage and are unaware how tight one area of there shoulder or neck is. This is very common and here is why:
- We only notice the worse area of pain - so if our right shoulder is more painful, we have a tendency to assume our left shoulder is OK.
- Trigger Points
- Poor Posture
- Muscle Damage
- Nervous Tension
- Physical Stress
- Psyschological Stress
- Environmental Factors - cold, damp
- Illness
- Lack of rest or sleep
- Poor Diet
- Restricted movement
- Tension headaches
- Referred pain
- Painful movement of a joint or limb
- Maintain good posture
- Manage your stress
- Follow a daily stretching routine
- Acupuncture
- Massage
