Diagnosis
Often, a physical exam alone can diagnose tendinitis. Your healthcare professional may press on the affected joint and move the joint into different positions.
Sometimes your healthcare professional may use imaging tests to help with diagnosis. Imaging tests may include:
- X-rays. This imaging test can show bone spurs or other potential causes for your pain, such as arthritis. Your healthcare professional might use X-rays to rule out other conditions that could be causing the symptoms.
- Ultrasound. This type of imaging test uses sound waves to make images of structures within your body, such as muscles and tendons.
- Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). An MRI machine uses radio waves and a magnetic field to create detailed images of the affected area of the body.
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Treatment
The goals of tendinitis treatment are to relieve pain, reduce irritation and prevent future tendon conditions. Self-care, including rest, ice and pain relievers, might be all that's needed. But full recovery might take several months.
Changing how you do certain activities and doing physical therapy exercises can help improve pain and prevent future injuries. Other treatment options include noninvasive and surgical procedures.
Treatment options for tendinitis may include:
Medicines
Pain relievers, such as aspirin, naproxen sodium (Aleve), ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin IB, others) or acetaminophen (Tylenol, others) may lessen pain. You also can apply pain-relieving creams or gels to the skin.
Physical therapy
Physical therapy exercises can help strengthen the muscle and tendon in the affected area. You can do resistance exercises to effectively treat many long-lasting tendon conditions.
Procedures
In situations where physical therapy hasn't resolved symptoms, your healthcare professional might suggest:
- Steroid injections. The effectiveness of steroid shots for tendinitis varies depending on the condition. A steroid shot around a tendon often helps to quickly ease the pain, though pain relief may be temporary. But repeated steroid shots can weaken a tendon and increase the risk of the tendon tearing over time.
- Dry needling. In this procedure, a healthcare professional makes small holes in the tendon with a fine needle. This procedure can reduce tendon pain.
- Shockwave therapy. This treatment uses high-energy sound waves or pressure waves to treat injured tissue. These waves promote blood flow to help the tissue heal. Treatment is done using a hand-held device that is placed on the skin.
- Ultrasound therapy. This treatment uses sounds waves to generate heat in the tissue. This can promote healing in a damaged tendon by increasing blood flow to the area.
- Platelet-rich plasma therapy. This treatment involves taking a sample of your own blood and spinning the blood to separate out the platelets and other healing factors. The solution is then injected into the area of long-lasting tendon irritation.
- Surgery. Depending on the seriousness of the injury, you may need to have surgery to repair the tendon, especially if the tendon has torn away from the bone. There are both minimally invasive and open procedures. A minimally invasive procedure usually results in less pain and quicker recovery than an open procedure. An open procedure requires a larger incision. Which procedure is best for you may depend on the type of injury to the tendon and its location.
Lifestyle and home remedies
To treat tendinitis at home, use rest, ice, compression and elevation. This treatment can help speed recovery and help prevent more issues.
- Rest. Avoid doing things that increase pain or swelling. Don't try to work or play through the pain. Healing requires rest, but not complete bed rest. You can do other activities and exercises that don't stress the injured tendon. Swimming and water exercise may be good options.
- Ice. To decrease pain, muscle spasm and swelling, apply ice to the injured area for up to 20 minutes several times a day. Ice packs, ice massage or slush baths with ice and water all can help. For an ice massage, freeze a paper cup full of water so that you can hold the cup while applying the ice directly to the skin.
- Compression. Because swelling can cause loss of motion in an injured joint, wrap the area tightly until the swelling stops. Use wraps or elastic bandages.
- Elevation. If tendinitis affects your knee, raise the hurt leg above the level of your heart to reduce swelling.
Although rest is a key to treating tendinitis, not moving joints can cause them to become stiff. After a few days of resting the injured area, gently move it through its full range of motion to keep your joints flexible.
Preparing for your appointment
You might start by talking to your family healthcare professional. You may be referred to a specialist in sports medicine or physical medicine and rehabilitation.
What you can do
You may want to write a list that includes:
- Details about your symptoms.
- Other medical conditions you've had.
- Medical conditions your parents, brothers and sisters have had.
- All the medicines and vitamins you take, including doses.
- Questions you want to ask the care team.
For tendinitis, some basic questions to ask include:
- What is the most likely cause of my symptoms?
- Are there other possible causes?
- What tests do I need?
- What treatment do you recommend?
- I have other medical issues. How best can I manage them together?
- Will I need to limit my activities?
- What self-care can I do at home?
What to expect from your doctor
Your healthcare professional is likely to ask you questions, such as:
- Where do you feel pain?
- When did your pain begin?
- Did it begin all at once or come on bit by bit?
- What kind of work do you do?
- What are your hobbies? What do you do for fun?
- Have you been instructed in proper ways to do your activity?
- Does your pain occur or worsen during certain activities, such as kneeling or climbing stairs?
- Have you recently had a fall or other kind of injury?
- What treatments have you tried at home?
- What did those treatments do?
- What, if anything, makes your symptoms better?
- What, if anything, makes your symptoms worse?