It’s easy to take your elbow for granted — until it starts bothering you. The most common causes of elbow discomfort are overuse and injury.
People who do trade work, such as carpenters, plumbers, and painters, struggle more with elbow pain, but injuries from playing sports like baseball, basketball, and, of course tennis account for a good proportion of elbow problems as well. Few haven’t heard of tennis elbow, for example.
David Dickerson, MD, and Shawn Denning, DNP, APN at Performance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine provide advanced care for a wide range of orthopedic problems and conditions, including elbow issues. What sets Performance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine apart from other practices is that Drs. Dickerson and Denning not only bring special expertise and years of experience to the table, but they also see every patient as unique and work to create a treatment plan that meets your specific needs.
You may have heard of carpal tunnel syndrome, when hand and arm pain originates from a pinched nerve in the wrist. But you may not be familiar with cubital tunnel syndrome, which is marked by multiple uncomfortable symptoms:
If you’ve suffered an elbow fracture or dislocation in the past, bone spurs, arthritis in your elbow, or have a cyst in close proximity to your elbow, you’re at greater risk of cubital tunnel syndrome.
Your elbow is the meeting place of your forearm’s bones. One is the radius, on the thumb side of your arm; the other is the ulna, on the little finger side. They both connect to your humerus, or upper arm bone. These three bones allow your elbow to perform its hinging action — think lifting a bag or tossing a frisbee — and they’re all held together by ligaments and tendons.
An injured ulnar nerve (you probably know it as your “funny bone”) is the root of cubital tunnel syndrome pain. The nerve passes through your cubital tunnel on the inside of your elbow, which consists of ligament, muscle, and bone, and when it becomes inflamed and irritated, your elbow pain can become severe.
Thickening of soft tissue that can cause your ulnar nerve to work improperly, ulnar nerve compression, and overstretching can all result in cubital tunnel syndrome.
When you suffer symptoms that Dr. Dickerson or Dr. Denning suspect may be cubital tunnel syndrome, they evaluate you thoroughly, discussing your history of elbow pain and current symptoms and using imaging tests, including X-rays and ultrasound, that provide them with valuable visual information about what’s going on in your elbow.
The team favors noninvasive ultrasound technology because it can reveal soft tissue damage more accurately. During this test, sound waves create moving images of your elbow that your doctor can observe. X-rays require that you hold your arm still, which doesn’t allow for as much information about your elbow to be observed.
You’re in the best hands here at Performance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine. The important thing is to seek treatment when you have cubital tunnel syndrome. Your doctor may recommend treatments such as:
If conservative or minimally invasive treatments don’t provide the relief you’d hoped for, a surgical solution may be required. Your Performance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine provider is highly skilled in performing minimally invasive arthroscopic elbow replacement surgery, which rids your elbow joint of damaged components and replaces them with new metal or plastic ones.
Minimally invasive surgical techniques, which employ high-tech cameras and specially designed surgical instruments that enable your surgeon to only make small incisions, are associated with faster healing and less pain, bleeding, and scarring.
Don’t let the agony of cubital tunnel syndrome stop you from living life to the fullest any longer. Call our office in Toms River or Shrewsbury, New Jersey, to schedule an appointment and create a path forward, or use our convenient online booking tool. You’re in the best hands at Performance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine. Just take a look at what our patients are saying about us to get an idea of the respect and high level of care you’ll receive here.
