Functional outcome of Conservative vs Steroid injection in Tennis elbow

Lateral epicondylitis which is also known as tennis elbow is a very painful condition which can restrict the daily activities of a person. It can be treated in various modalities out of which local corticosteroid and physiotherapy with analgesics are the common modes which has shown good results in the past. However there exists a conflict between the functional outcome and the efficiency of these two modalities with no definitive conclusion on which is the better among the two. In this study we compare the functional outcome between the two modalities at a follow up of six weeks and found that local corticosteroid injection has proved to give faster relief from symptoms with early return to work. However patients who were treated with analgesics and physiotherapy also showed significant improvement during the course of treatment. This study will help to decide which among the two modalities have a better result and what the management protocol to be followed is.