{"id":5140,"date":"2019-03-19T05:47:18","date_gmt":"2019-03-19T05:47:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/simplyhealth.today\/?p=5140"},"modified":"2021-05-04T13:22:10","modified_gmt":"2021-05-04T13:22:10","slug":"14-signs-of-tendonitis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/simplyhealth.today\/14-signs-of-tendonitis\/","title":{"rendered":"14 Signs of Tendonitis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Tendonitis is caused by damage to a tendon, which connects the muscle to the bone. Tendonitis occurs most often with elbows and knees, but it can also affect the shoulder. This condition has similar symptoms to other conditions, such as bursitis, Achilles heel, and arthritis. The best way to tell whether the symptoms are the result of tendonitis if there are a number of signs occurring together. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If there is swelling, pain or stiffness near the joint, your tendon may be damaged. A doctor can determine whether this is the cause by doing a test for bursitis or similar conditions. Tendonitis can make it more likely that you will suffer further injuries because problems with the tendon can cause the muscles to be weaker. You may run the risk of developing tendonitis if you are involved in a sport or a job that requires repetitive movement<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Swelling of Tendon<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

One of the first symptoms of tendonitis is swelling <\/a>in the area. Since tendons are all over the body and connect muscle to bone, this swelling can occur anywhere, but most cases of tendonitis occur right around the joints, most commonly around the elbow or the knee. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The tendons in these areas are more vulnerable because of the bending that takes place in the elbow and the knee, particularly from certain sports or repetitive work activities that involve the constant movement of the elbow or kneeling. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Swelling may not be caused by tendonitis but could be the result of an internal infection, so determine whether there are other symptoms present, such as pain and stiffness. Swelling around the knee could be the result of septic bursitis rather than tendonitis, and can be determined by a doctor taking fluid out of your knee.
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2. Pain near the joint<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Pain <\/a>is a common symptom of tendonitis and is usually one of the first that is noticed. However, pain is not necessarily a confirmation of the condition. You may have simply pulled something at work or through exercise and a little rest may cause your muscle to relax. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, if the pain does not subside you may have done something more serious than pulling a muscle but may have damaged the tendon, which connects the muscle to the bone. The joints are more prone to tendon damage that other areas of the body because of the amount of bending that is done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you have engaged in activities that may tend to cause tendonitis, such as house painting or certain sports such as tennis and baseball, you may have more reason to suspect your pain is from tendonitis. Try physical therapy to find ways to move that can prevent injury.
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3. Stiffness near the joint<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

If your tendons are damaged, you may feel stiffness <\/a>around the joint. The job of the tendon is to stiffen to facilitate movement and cause the muscle to move the joint. However, if there is excessive and repetitive movement and the stiffness is overworked, the tendons lose their ability to relax properly and stiffness can be a major symptom. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These symptoms are often seen by those who are too sedentary or athletes and workers who have overused their muscles and put strained on their tendons with repetitive motion. Moderate exercise and working in a way that will not cause strain are the best ways to prevent injuries like tendonitis. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stretching out before exercise can help prevent or relieve this stiffness. In addition, massages can be helpful in relaxing the tendon and the muscles. Consulting a physical therapist can be helpful as a way of learning ways to move and work properly.
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4. Muscle Weakness<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The job of the tendons is to connect the muscle <\/a>to the bone. When the tendon is injured, the muscles in the area of the tendon can often become weaker as the result. If the problem is not corrected right away, the muscle can atrophy, and it may take some time to regain strength in the muscle. With the weakening of the muscle, you may get in a habit of avoiding using the muscle and it can get even weaker. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This can lead to a vicious cycle because as the muscles and tendons get weaker, they can be prone to further injury. This can be particularly true in the elbows, knees, and shoulders. One way to avoid tendonitis is to exercise frequently, both aerobic activity and strength training. Warm-up before exercising to avoid injury. Overstrain can also cause tendonitis, so it is important to find a balance.
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5. Warmth in the area<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

When a tendon has been damaged, the area can become warm or hot and red. This can also occur with regular muscle strain, bursitis or infection. Tendonitis <\/a>specifically has some telltale signs in addition to redness, and warmth, including stiffness and pain around the elbow and the knee. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To rule out bursitis, your doctor may take fluid from the bursa underneath the knee to see if there is inflammation or infection. If the warmth and swelling is not the result of bursitis, you may be suffering from tendonitis. One way to treat heat in the area is to apply ice packs or cold compresses and to elevate your elbow or knee. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the symptoms do not go away on their own, see a doctor ensure you do not have an infection or another condition. If you find your knee or elbow gets hotter when you move it, try resting the area.
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6. Grinding Sensation<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

If you feel a grinding sensation when you put your palm over your tendon, you may be suffering from crepitus which is a symptom of tendonitis or Achilles heel. The grinding sensation is the direct result of inflammation and swelling over the tendon when it has been damaged. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When your body is suffering from tendonitis, it brings injured and damaged cells to the surface and causes a grinding feeling in the area. Grinding alone is not necessarily tendonitis or Achilles heel<\/a>. It can also be due to a joint being out of alignment or deterioration of the cartilage around the bone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A snapping or popping noise can be heard when the tendon is stretched across the bone when there has been damage to the tendon. To determine whether the popping and cracking are caused by a problem with the bone or the tendon, look for other symptoms of tendonitis.
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7. Dull pain in the shoulder<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

One kind of tendonitis, known as Rotator Cuff Tendonitis<\/a>, is characterized by a dull pain in a shoulder that may last for hours. It often can\u2019t be associated with one specific location in the shoulder. The sensation can often radiate from the shoulder to the chest and to other areas of the body. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You may find that the pain is more intense at night when you are trying to sleep. If you have an occupation or are involved in a sport that requires consistent elevation of the arm or shoulder, you may have a reason to suspect Rotator Cuff tendonitis. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This condition often results from overuse and repetitive motion. Those who run the risk of developing this condition include painters, welders, tennis players, carpenters, and baseball players. If you are male, over 40 and involved in these occupations, your painful shoulder could be tendonitis.
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8. Pain above or below the knee or elbow<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

There are various types of tendonitis that can be specifically signaled by pain above or below the knee or elbow. If you have pain that starts on the outer portion of the elbow <\/a>that extends all the way down to the wrist, you could have a form of tendonitis called tennis elbow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your tendons that connect the muscles of your lower arm to the bone may be damaged and may be swollen and painful. Tennis elbow doesn\u2019t affect only tennis players, but anyone who regularly does repetitive gripping motion as part of work or sport. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pain in the inner part of the elbow is referred to as golfer\u2019s elbow, which results from muscles on the inner side of your arm become connected to a bony bump. Similar conditions can occur in the knee area and are characterized by an ache on the outside or inside of the knee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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9. Loss of Coordination<\/strong>
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Along with muscle weakness<\/a>, it is also common to experience a loss of coordination. You might, therefore, find that it becomes more difficult to pick things up without dropping them, or that you are more prone to falling over \u2013 depending on where it is that the tendonitis has occurred.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part of the reason for this is the loss of strength, which can, in turn, make it difficult to carry out normal movements with the same precision and accuracy as normal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time though, loss of coordination might also result from changes to the \u2018input\u2019 received from muscle. What many of us don\u2019t realize, is that muscle (or more accurately the muscle-tendon unit) actually is responsible for providing us with an additional sense. The \u2018Golgi-tendon organ\u2019 is responsible for this sensation and helps us to identify the lengthening or shortening of the muscle. If this is impacted, it can negatively affect \u2018proprioception\u2019 and your ability to know where your body is in space at any given time.
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10. Discoloration<\/strong>
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If you have damage to your tendon, then this will very often cause redness and swelling in the affected area. Of course, this is the body\u2019s way of trying to heal the damage: it will send blood and oxygen <\/a>to the area in a bid to try and provide nutrients and antibodies to accelerate the healing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in some cases you might find that the affected area becomes discolored: it might start to look dark blue, yellowish, or even black. If this happens, it suggests that you have an infection and that this is what is actually causing tendonitis. It is important to make this distinction, as in this case, a simple shot of corticosteroids is not the correct treatment: instead, you will need a course of antibiotics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This discoloration is caused by the bacteria destroying the tissue around the joint and so it\u2019s very important to treat the problem as early as possible to prevent it from worsening.
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11. Fever<\/strong>
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A fever <\/a>is another common issue that can result from an infection of the tendons. This is again caused by the body trying to fight the problem and encourage healing: which it will do by increasing your core temperature to make the environment that is your body a less hospitable habitat for the germs. You might find that you experience chills alongside profuse sweating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you do experience a fever, know that this is a normal reaction to the infection and not something to be concerned about. However, it is important to keep yourself well hydrated and to monitor the severity of the temperature in case it gets too high.
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12. Muscular Imbalance<\/strong>
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Muscular imbalance<\/a> means that one set of muscles is more developed than the other. If you have chronic tendonitis that has been affecting you for a long time, then you might notice that the musculature on one side of your body is more developed than the other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, if you have tendonitis in a knee joint, this can then cause one leg to become more developed than the other. Alternatively, it might cause your hamstrings or alternatively your quadriceps to outpace the antagonistic muscle. Effectively you are shifting your weight in such a way as to cause one area to develop more quickly than the other.
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13. Mobility Issues<\/strong>
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Mobility issues can also occur as a result of tendonitis. As well as providing force in order to work joints<\/a>, muscle-tendon-units (MTUs) also have the important property of elasticity, which along with elasticity in the muscle, allows us to become more flexible and to reach our toes, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we have swelling in a tendon however, this can, of course, cause a reduction in that flexibility (called hysteresis), and that can make it harder to move freely. You might now find that movements that should not cause any challenge \u2013 such as squatting low \u2013 now become very difficult.
Likewise, you might find that the changes in muscular development introduce similar issues. If one set of muscles should become stronger than the others, then this can place unequal pressure on the joints and thereby make it difficult to move through the usual range of motion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are a number of basic fundamental movements that we should all be able to perform: squatting, twisting, pressing, pulling, etc. If you have lost range of motion in any of these, then it is important to understand the underlying cause.
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14. Deferred Pain<\/strong>
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Deferred pain is pain that you feel somewhere other than the actual affected area. Lets\u2019 say that you have tendonitis in your elbow then: deferred pain would mean that you\u2019d actually feel discomfort in the arm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This can happen commonly with tendonitis in particular for the reasons that we explained earlier. For example, if you have pain in the knee, it\u2019s common for this to translate to discomfort in the spine<\/a>. What is happening, is that you are compensating for the pain, and thereby changing your gait in such a way that it is placing extra pressure on the back. Very common is to feel this in the lumbar region of the spine (the very bottom), which will be affected by the hip flexors and extensors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you have tendonitis it is very important to get it seen to early, to prevent these kinds of corrective behaviors that can lead to more discomfort and pain in the long-term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\r\n

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