Discussion: elbow cortisone shot

I'm surprised to find that I have one of the possible side effects of a cortisone shot--lose of skin pigment around the injection. Since I'm light skinned, it is not much of a problem. The knee shots didn't do this, but the elbow one was so close to the surface. I thought she said the skin might turn darker, shows how much I was listening.

a little loss of skin pigmentation would be a cheap price to get some relief from this elbow situation. So far no beneficial effect. How long do you think I should wait before deciding this was no help?

I don't really remember. I think it increased the soreness for a few days and then started to feel better and I continued to ice it. I saw her after 2 weeks and it was still very sore to the touch but general movement was much better. I did a bunch of exercises for the next month and it was greatly improved. Playing golf has set it back a bit. A friend had a wrist problem and she needed a second shot after a month to get good relief.

What have you done for exercises? The initial pain from the shot has worn off (2 days). So far just back to the pre-shot level of pain.

Stretching is #1 although my wrist arthritis made this difficult. So outstretched arm, then stretch wrist so hand bends all the way down and also up. Also do this with other hand applying pressure against the stretched hand to increase the stretch. Several of the others are moving the hand through its range of motion with light weights while resting the elbow and forearm on something. I now use 3 lbs. but started with less. So hand faces down, or up, or sideways then through the natural range of motion, contracting the muscles where necessary. Also turning the hand and forearm over from up to down. 10 reps of each of these at a time. I was supposed to build up to one exercise using a hammer. Elbow, forearm and hand resting on something like a table--hold the base of the hammer in hand so it is 90 deg. to the table, then slowly let it drop and then lift so it travels from one side to the other keeping your hand in contact with the surface ( 180 deg.). I continued to ice and take ibuprofen. These exercises are easy to demonstrate, but I'm not sure if my instructions make sense. Questions?

Seems clear enough. The hammer seems like a good thing to try. I am feeling a bit better now 3 days post-shot. I'll give you a hammer report. I have been doing that kind of stretching for the last 6 weeks or so, and it feels better today than it has at any time previously, so I assume the shot has done some good.

She also said that doing a lot on the computer can cause "tennis" elbow and recommended keeping the keyboard low.