Abstract
We aimed to investigate the changes caused by focused extracorporeal shock wave pain therapy (f-ESWT) in patients with patellar tendinopathy by means of ultrasound imaging. We included 18 knees from 11 college athletes with patellar tendinopathy. We assessed the tendon thickness and blood flow of the patellar tendon using ultrasound imaging, rest pain using NRS and tenderness using a pressure pain gauge. We recorded four measurements: immediately before f-ESWT (PRE①) and after f-ESWT (POST①) and two weeks after the first irradiation before f-ESWT (PRE②) and after f-ESWT (POST②). Only the resting pain in both the first and second irradiations showed a significant difference immediately before and after the treatment. In terms of pain changes after two weeks later, we observed significant differences in the resting pain between PRE① and PRE② and also in the resting pain, tenderness and blood flow area between PRE① and POST②. No significant difference was seen in the tendon thickness. We concluded that pain in the patellar tendon at rest decreased before and after irradiation, suggesting that f-ESWT may have influenced the nociceptive structures and had an analgesic effect.
Highlights
Focused extracorporeal shock wave pain therapy (f-ESWT), one of the pain treatment methods for tendinopathies, has received increasing attention in recent years. f-ESWT’s main effects are pain relief [1], tissue repair [2] and bone formation promotion [3]
Statistical Analysis before and after irradiation, we found a significant difference only in Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) after the first and second irradiations and no significant difference in the other items
Throughout the was set at a riskstudy rate of less than period, we found no significant difference in patellar tendon thickness (Figure 6)
Summary
Focused extracorporeal shock wave pain therapy (f-ESWT), one of the pain treatment methods for tendinopathies, has received increasing attention in recent years. f-ESWT’s main effects are pain relief [1], tissue repair [2] and bone formation promotion [3]. Focused extracorporeal shock wave pain therapy (f-ESWT), one of the pain treatment methods for tendinopathies, has received increasing attention in recent years. Patellar tendinopathy is an overuse disorder frequently seen in sportspersons who participate in jumping, dashing and turning motions, such as in volleyball [7,8] and basketball [9,10]. Excessive tension in the patellar tendon due to jumping and dashing motions leads to microdamage and inflammation of the tendon’s parenchyma, thereby resulting in patellar tendinopathy [11,12]. The main pathogenesis of patellar tendinopathy includes degeneration and collagen malalignment, collagen changes from type I to Type III of the tendon, abnormal blood vessels in the sparing area and increased growth of nerve fibres [10,13,14]
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