Muscle Strains, Tendon Injuries & Repetitive Strain Injuries
Darwin Osteopath providing comprehensive treatment and management for a wide variety of muscle and tendon complaints.
Muscles strains and tendon injuries can come about from an acute incident or commonly due to an increased biomechanical load over a prolonged period of time. In order to get sustained relief, the load on the area must be reduced by assessing and treating surrounding structures. Whilst simultaneously building up the functional capacity of the muscle/tendon giving the symptoms.
Example case study
· 42-year-old male with right sided achilles pain, the pain comes on upon rising from prolonged sitting, getting out of bed and running. He has a history of calf strain from his football days and has always been stiff in the calf/achilles however never had pain. The pain came on in the last couple of weeks after starting training for 10km fun run.
· Upon examination it was found that he was weight bearing more so on the right side, had restricted right side ankle mobility, and tension right along the back of the calf and hamstring. An achilles tendinopathy was diagnosed caused by recent increase in running load and pre-disposed to by history of calf injury.
· Treatment involved doing some dry needling to the calf and hamstring muscles to reduced tension down the back of the leg. Also, some articulation was performed to loosen off the ankle joint and reduce load on achilles.
· Management involved systematically re-loading the achilles tendon to create greater strength in the tendon to be able to cope with an increased running load. Exercises were given immediately, following current evidence-based advice, and gradually increased the exercise load to allow him to get back to training for the fun run. Advice was also given to ensure he wasn’t resting on the right leg when standing still.