Adductor Tendinopathy

The hip adductor muscles help bring your legs together and rotate your hip inwards. The short adductors include the pectineus, adductor brevis, and adductor longus, and the long adductors include the adductor magnus and gracilis. These start at your pubic bone where the crease of your inner thigh meets your body and move down your thigh bone to the inside of your knee. At the end of these muscles are tendons, which are tough, fibrous tissues that connect muscles to bones.

Groin injuries comprise 2 - 5% of all sports injuries; adductor tendinitis and tendinopathy are among the most common causes of groin pain in athletes. The adductor longus is responsible for 62% of groin injuries, and tends to be the most prone to injury, followed by the gracilis muscle. This injury is problematic among athletes especially runners and professional dancers, as both activites stress the adductor tendon quite heavily.

The initial damage can range from overstretching or a slightly pulled muscle (grade 1 strain) to partial tearing (grade 2 strain), to complete rupturing of your adductor muscle or tendon fibers (grade 3 strain). If you do not allow your tissues to heal properly, your previous adductor injuries will build upon each other. The inability of your tendon to repair itself encourages microtears to accumulate faster than they can heal, increasing the breakdown of your tissue and reinforcing your pain and disability. The majority of adductor strains are grade 1 or 2 strains that involve partial tears, where your adductor tendon and muscle meet.

Causes and Diagnosing

The most common cause of tendon inflammation is overuse of your adductors. It results from repetitive stress placed on your adductor muscles and tendons during active sports (especially when running, kicking, twisting, or side-stepping), as a result of a sudden fall or direct hit, and/or overexerting yourself in everyday activities that involve twisting or lifting heavy objects while bending or running on an unstable surface (like grass or mud).

Alignment issues and leg length discrepancies, which affect the way you walk, or incorrect sport-specific motions, as well as strength differences in your muscles, lack of exercise and obesity, age-related weaknesses and/or degeneration, and genetics.

Your doctor will perform a medical history and physical examination, and may use some diagnostic tests (including X-Rays, MRIs, bone scans, CT scans, and diagnostic ultrasound) to determine your situation.

Prevention

Avoid doing too much too soon - decrease, modify and/or avoid any activities that cause pain and irritation.

Stabilize your groin, pelvis and hip area, build your core strength with light weights, exercise bands and balls, core balance training, and exercises to develop strength, speed and agility, such as jumping or bounding. Yoga, tai chi, or a daily stretching routine will also help keep your muscles and joints supple, and will increase your range of motion. Combine these with regular low-impact exercise and healthy diet.

Always warm up and cool down your muscles, learn the proper form and techniques to prevent injuries, and utilize any available mobility supports (braces, taping, orthotics, canes) to help alleviate undue stress and improve your function.

Treatment

When treating adductor tendinitis rest the area, apply ice for 10-20 minutes at a time for at least 3 times a day. Do this to the injured area for the first day up to 3 days. Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy may be used after the acute swelling is improved. Ice will reduce initial inflammation and swelling and Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy increases blood flow through the area to speed the healing process. This can be further helped by the use of ultrasound applications over the affected area, as it reduces swelling quickly and increases blood flow to the area, helping the tendon heal more quickly.

The trick to any tendon injury is getting it to heal with minimal scar tissue formation and with as much realignment of tendon fibers as possible - something both Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy and therapeutic ultrasound are great at! Even with optimum healing there is always less elasticity in a previously injured tendon. The trick is to make sure you heal this the best you can, that way your chance of reinjury down the road is much lower than average.

Therapeutic Products

Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy

You can help your body repair itself by speeding its natural healing process using an Inferno Wrap™. The Inferno Wrap's patented design delivers the most effective Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy you can find. During normal activities, the movement promotes blood flow through our body. Our body responds to the movement by sending oxygen and nutrient-rich blood to the muscles, joints, tendons and other soft tissue in the body. When at rest, the blood flow to your tendons is greatly reduced. Unfortunately, when your tendon is injured it requires rest but it also needs the blood flow to promote the healing process. Since you can't work your tendon without danger of further injury, you need to stimulate the blood flow another way. Our innovative Inferno Wrap™ gives you the best Blood Flow Stimulation Therapy available. The Inferno Wrap™ creates energy waves that stimulate blood flow by penetrating through the outer layers of your body. The energy waves reach deep into your muscles, tendons and cartilage, reducing your pain as they heal the inner tissue.

An Inferno Wrap™ gives you unparalleled blood flow stimulation to your injured tendon. You simply won’t find a comparable product on the market. Other therapy products can not come close to offering the comfortable, contoured fit and targeted energy treatment an Inferno Wrap™ provides. You will experience a soothing, penetrating warmth deep in the tissue as it works to stimulate your blood flow, we guarantee it. Now you can reduce your pain and heal yourself with the comfortable, light weight Inferno Wrap™.

The Inferno Wrap™ provides effective, non-invasive, non-addictive pain relief with no side effects.

When your tendon has healed somewhat and it comes time for more aggressive rehabilitation, stretching and activity, Blood Flow Stimultation Therapy warms the muscles in the injured area which increases range of motion and allows for a safer more thorough stretch.

Therapeutic Ultrasound

Ultrasound Therapy is also a great tool for pain prevention of tendonitis or healing a tendon tear, and having a therapeutic ultrasound device at home can be a powerful and convenient treatment tool. If you have symptoms of tendonitis or are recovering from a tendon injury, using ultrasound on a regular basis before your activity or throughout the day will help relax your tendons and muscles, diminish pain and inflammation, soften scar tissue and contribute greatly to the healing of your injury.

Therapeutic Ultrasound heats and massages your soft tissue giving you three primary benefits. First, it increases blood flow in the treated area which speeds your body's natural healing process. Second, it reduces swelling and edema which are the main sources of pain. Third, ultrasound softens existing scar tissue and minimizes the build up of new scar tissue resulting in reduced pain while healing and greater flexibility once healing is complete.

Eucalyptus...
It's in our Gel!

Ultrasound can also be used to administer therapeutic medicines into the body. This is a process known as phonophoresis. Ultrasound with Phonophoresis is rapidly becoming more popular than Ultrasound Therapy alone.

Peppermint...
It's in our gel too!

Our MendMeShop Lavender Infusion Gel is the only topical therapeutic gel that is also a Phonophoretic Ultrasound Gel. It is made with natural medical ingredients including eucalyptus, peppermint, Bulgarian lavender and menthol. These effective ingredients have anesthetic, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, decongestant, and circulatory stimulant properties. When applied topically and massaged into the skin, MendMeShop Lavender Infusion Gel relieves pain and speeds healing without any side-effects.

Cold Compression Therapy

Our cold compression wraps work by interrupting and slowing nerve and cell function in the area of your injured tendon. Once blood vessels are damaged they can no longer carry oxygenated blood to the damaged tissue and therefore cells begin to break-down. The deep cold provided by our cold compression wraps slows cell function thereby reducing cellular break-down. Furthermore, because the cold wraps serve to numb the nerves, the wraps also reduce pain!

Our Cold Compression Wraps are recommended as the top wrap by Leading Health Institutes like, Cleveland Clinic, several professional sports organizations, and countless medical professionals. That's why we sell them, because they are the best. We have noticed over time that our customers are so fond of our cold wraps that they are frequently coming back and ordering a second one - this way they can cool one while wearing the other.

Always allow the injured area to return to normal body temperature between hot and cold treatments by waiting 60-90 minutes before applying a different therapy.