Useful Stuff

Tennis elbow, characterized by pain, weakness and inflammation or degeneration of the wrist-extensor tendon that connects to the elbow, is one of those intractable overuse injures that, until recently, yielded very reluctantly to treatment.

A recent study was performed that used people suffering from chronic tennis elbow with a control group given standard physiotherapy and massage treatments while another group were each given a Thera-Band FlexBar and a specific set of exercises to perform 3 times per day.

The results were unequivocal in only a couple of months. The group who did the exercises with the FlexBar were almost completely cured of their tennis elbow while the control group showed little or no improvement.

The Thera-Band FlexBar is a simple rubber piece of equipment that is only around 12″ long. It can be twisted and bent and springs back to its original shape and position. The exercise are incredibly simple but they are certainly effective. Using this exercise regime with the FlexBar not only gives patients a quick response but it also provides an extremely cheap form of rehabilitiation.

Eccentric contractions require the muscle to work against a force, in this case the coiled bar.

The lead researcher who came up with the exercises is Dr Tim Tyler and the exercise has been termend the Tyler Twist. He had this to say about the exercises: “It’s not a difficult exercise but it is unique, so I would advise people to be taught by a physical therapist, if possible,” Tyler says. “If not, proceed on your own — after, of course, an examination by a doctor; elbow pain can have many causes, not just tennis elbow. “In my opinion, you’re not going to hurt yourself,” Tyler continues, although you should be prepared for a commitment.

Food allergies are not completely uncommon with a good proportion of the population showing some kind of reaction to a wide variety of different food types. One of the less common types of food allergies reported around the world is an allergy to shellfish. Although most people immediately think of shellfish such as crabs and lobsters, other types of popular foods are included in this general grouping such as oysters, octopus and squid.

The thing about an allergy to food such as oysters is that there could be a far greater instance of allergy to them but we don’t know about it because it is not a type of food that is widely eaten. A large proportion of the population will either never have come in contact with them or, if they do, have no desire to attempt to put one in their mouth.

There are a number of possible types of oyster allergy symptoms that may present themselves starting with mild itching around and inside the mouth. Hives is possibly the most common symptom to come from eating oysters if you are allergic. But the allergic reaction can be much more severe, right up to anaphylactic shock which can result in death.

Oysters are a kind of mollusk and generally, if you are allergic to one kind of mollusk then it is possible that you will be allergic to others. The answer is to be very wary of any kind of mollusk assuming that there will be some kind of allergic reaction after eating them.

You can expect any allergy to begin to present itself within the first 90 minutes after ingestion. This doesn’t mean that an allergic reaction won’t occur outside of this timeframe. Any sign of itching or swelling in or around the mouth or breathing difficulties could be put down to the shellfish or oysters that you have recently eaten.