Steroid injection therapy is the best conservative treatment for lateral epicondylitis: a prospective randomised controlled trial
PainSci summary of Tonks 2007?This page is one of thousands in the PainScience.com bibliography. It is not a general article: it is focused on a single scientific paper, and it may provide only just enough context for the summary to make sense. Links to other papers and more general information are provided at the bottom of the page, as often as possible. ★★★☆☆?3-star ratings are for typical studies with no more (or less) than the usual common problems. Ratings are a highly subjective opinion, and subject to revision at any time. If you think this paper has been incorrectly rated, please let me know.
“On the basis of the results of this study, the authors advocate steroid injection alone as the first line of treatment for patients presenting with tennis elbow demanding a quick return to daily activities.”
original abstract†Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.
The relative merits of a watch and wait policy, physiotherapy alone, steroid injection therapy alone, and physiotherapy and steroid injection therapy combined, for the treatment of tennis elbow, were assessed using a prospective randomised controlled trial (RCT) of factorial design. Although RCTs comparing different treatment strategies for tennis elbow have previously been published, to our knowledge none of the previous studies have combined the modalities of physiotherapy and steroid injection as one of the treatment groups, as we have done in this study. Patients who received steroid injection were statistically significantly better for all outcome measures at follow up. No statistically significant effect of physiotherapy nor interaction between physiotherapy and injection was found. On the basis of the results of this study, the authors advocate steroid injection alone as the first line of treatment for patients presenting with tennis elbow demanding a quick return to daily activities.
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