Comparative study between local corticosteroid injection and diclofenac sodium in initial treatment of tennis elbow

Abstract

This is a prospective study done to compare the effectiveness of local corticosteroid injection versus non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (diclofenac sodium) for initial treatment of new episode of tennis elbow. The patients were evaluated with a pain score (0 to 9) and clinical examination beit)re and 4 weeks after treatment. The selection of cases was done randomally. 18 patients were included in this study who attend orthopedics outpatient clinic in Samarra general hospital during the period from 1-1-2013 to I-11-2013. The first group include 9 patients were given an injection of 20 mg methylpredinsolone plus 0.5 ml lidocaine and the second group also include 9 patients were given diclofenac sodium 100mg daily for 2 weeks. After 4 weeks ; S patients (88%) in the injection group were completely better compared with 4 patients (44%) in the diclofenac sodium group(p <0.05) regarding pain scores also in the assessment of elbow function 5 patients (56%) had cornplete recovery in group of steroid injection while only one patient had complete recovery in the group treated with dicofenac sodium(11%) the p value < 0.05.