Elbow pain in golfers is one of the most frustrating injuries I see as a Physical Therapist.
Most typically golfers can get tennis elbow or lateral epicondylitis on their lead arm or golfers elbow or medial epicondylitis on the trial arm. I know you don’t care about that, but just know that I’m sympathizing with you because elbow pain sucks.
Many factors can lead to elbow pain in golfers, but the primary cause is an overuse of the upper body in the swing and an underuse of the lower body. This can stem from many different factors and a few different causes.
Reduced of use of lower body power often comes from a lack of mobility at the hips that causes the golfer to stand up out of their swing or “early extension” at the end of the backswing that negates the recoil developed in the backswing. At this point the golfer will continue to rotate through the upper body, often causing “reverse spine angle” at the top of the backswing and an initiation of swing through the upper body. Without using the lower body power to initiate the swing the player may also ineffectively weight shift from the trail to lead leg or “hang back” which limits the use of the lower body in the downswing as well.
Impaired lower body power production will then lend itself into excessive upper body motion which may look like swinging “over the top” or “chicken winging” at contact with the ball. With the repetitive nature of the golf swing thus overuse is a huge injury inducing pattern at the elbow.
The elbow itself will need some strengthening, mobility and control to promote healing. But often times treating down the chain into the hips will ultimately resolve the factors that caused this pain to begin with. This can all be determined through a TPI screen to figure out what cause put you at injury risk.
As you can tell, the elbow pain from golf can stem from a multitude of reasons — that’s why we want everyone to take this at home swing and mobility assessment to determine where their tightness lies, and figure out what the first steps are to getting you pain free
Come on in for your assessment so we can get you out of pain and swinging great next season. I have also found dry needling highly effective for elbow tendonitis in combination with some swing mechanics training. You probably don't realize it, but Physical Therapy can be on of the best things for your golf swing! Reach out if you have any questions about what this might involve!
