Clinical Facts

Tennis elbow, golfer’s elbow, mouse elbow. All of the are colloquial names for the epicondylitis. The used terms depend on the muscles and tendon affected.

In the outer tendon, the radial epicondyle, the common name is tennis elbow.
At the inner tendon, the medial epicondyle it is called the golfer’s elbow.

The correct medical term for the tennis elbow is “epicondylitis humeri radialis“, the golfer’s elbow has the terminology “epicondylitis humeri ulnaris“. Ulna and Radius are the latin terms for ell and spoke.

A newer term is the mouse arm, as more people are exposed to one-sided burden of work on the computer.

Just like the tennis elbow and golfer’s elbow, especcially the mouse arm is connected to the formation mechanism of the Repetitive Strain Injury-Syndrom (RSI-Syndrom) ^{(Reference: Wikipedia)}
Basically, however, the epicondylitis can occur in all activities that strain the arm, even a wrong sleeping position can trigger the injury.

That is why the vast majority of patients suffering from an “tennis” or “golfer’s” elbow have never played tennis or golf in their entire lives.

There are several occupational groups, in which the incidence of the injury is markedly higher:

• Forest workers: up to 29%
• Montage automotive industry: up to 20%
• Cooks: up to 10,5%
• Plastic surgery: up to 13,1 %

Disease duration
In general it is assumed that the disease duration averages from 6 to 48 months. From a disease duration of 6 months onwards, the epicondylitis is classified as being a chronic disorder.

Loss of working time / recurrence
Based on statistics of the CSST, Quebec (2009), the average loss of working time is about 83,7 days per patient and the risk of recurrence is about 10,6% for certain professional groups.

Now you see that the epicondylitis is pretty common and widely spread and may need a long time to heal completely.

With each movement of the arm, fingers or wrist tensile forces of the forearm muscles act on the tendon attachments (Epicondyli) at the elbow. Unusually high loads, strenuous or repetitive movements of the arm can lead to microcracks in these tendons and they may become inflamed. ^{(Reference: Netdoktor), (Reference: Wikipedia)}

With increasing age, chances grow that the injury / illness will be chronic, because starting at age of about 40, the production of collagen automatically decreases and tendons are significantly less elastic and resilient.

This leads to severe pain in the elbow area and it may hurt under heavy loads as well as in hibernation, even during sleep. Origin is either an inflammation or an injury.

Once being diagnosed with an epicondylitis by a physician, the first prescribed treatment often is the cortison injection.
As this may help against the inflammation it does not fight the causes of the epicondylitis – physical forces.
To reduce these forces, additionally the common clamps and clasps are decreed.
These braces, claps, splints or orthoses are all working with the exact same mechanism of action: Compression of the muscles.

The Masalo® Cuff works very successfully with a completely unique and new mechanism of action.

The muscles and tendons of the forearm are “mounted” to the tendon insertions at the elbow.
With each movement of the arm, fingers or wrist tensile forces of the forearm muscles act on the tendon attachments (Epicondyli) at the elbow. Unusually high loads, strenuous or repetitive movements of the arm can lead to microcracks in these tendons and they may become inflamed.

You can easily see these tensile forces with your own eyes:
Put your arm on a table and simply move your fingers. You will instantly see the movement at the outer epicondylus.
Or just close your hand and make a fist (repeatedly) and reopen your hand. If you now take your other hand and gently touch your lower part of the forearm in the area of the tendon insertions, you will feel how your muscles – the tensile forces – work.

Just like the intensity of pain differs from person to person, the trigger of the epicondylitis as well is very various.
Active people like craftsmen, office-employees (working at a PC: mousearm), warehouse workers, retail salesmen and saleswomen, homemaker, athletes, hobby gardeners etc. are often affected. Even knitting, raking or snow shoveling can trigger the injury.

Very often the epicondylitis is caused by exceptional or unusual and unfamiliar activities such as moving, spring-cleaning, construction works, special tasks at the job, slipping on the ice (and the involved arm support to prevent falling) etc.

Once the injury is triggered and the microcracks and microtears occur at the tendon insertions, they are strained and exacerbated by almost every simple all day activity such as shaking hands, brushing teeth, combing hair, setting the table or every arm and hand use in sports etc.
The vicious circle begins and the tensile forces “do their work”.

By the way – both tennis elbow and golfer’s elbow have the same causes. The actual trigger-activity is then the decisive factor whether the injury occurs at the medial or the radial epicondylus.

The Masalo® Cuff MED works with the proven Masalo® counter-traction principle, which is still unique in the field of epicondylitis treatment. More than 26,000 customers have already been able to rid their treacherous injury with the help of our Masalo® BASIC leather cuff.

The comfortable forearm cuff of the Masalo® cuff MED is placed a few inches apart from the elbow and fixed with the high-quality and very durable Velcro fastener. The upper arm strap is then also fastened with a Velcro and adjusted accordingly to the desired activity and load of the arm.