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530. Drew <drew.sack*heim@gmail.com>
Email of 06.06.11
Hey Thomas. I just wanted to thank you so much for your email. It is so appreciated. Also, while I've done quite a bit of 'physio', some acupuncture and all the rest (and as I told you initially it is on the way to healing), your website made a huge difference. When you basically said to just carry on doing things, well, thats what I've started to do and what a difference it makes. Also, I've increased the amount of stretching beyond what I was doing before and I'm so pleased. So again, thank you for putting this information out there and also for responding to my email. God bless. drew
23.06.11, 15.13h Dear Drew. Thanks for your email. Keep on stretching, and if you can hanging on the door-bar and within some more weeks you will get better and better. Glad you improved, it will continue, you will see. God bless you, Thomas

Drew <drew.sack*heim@gmail.com>
Email of 03.06.11
Hello. I am in nyc. I have been dealing with tennis elbow since 8 months now. I've worked with some very good people who do body work here in new york. Everyone seems to have a slightly different vision of it. The one clear thing for me though, is that everyone seems to agree that actually the injury is not necessarily in the elbow, but elsewhere in my body (shoulders involved). I've done so many things. I can definitely say that the problem and the pain are improving a lot. The reason I wanted to email you is because I found your site and found it very helpful to me. I Have been doing stretching for quite a while (but now more rigorously than I did before). What spoke to me is two things. 1) You said it's very important to keep using the arm. I felt very confused as to what I should do or should not do. I play guitar (not professionally though) and I had stopped for 2 months. Like you say, it affects you psychologically when you change your habits too much. 2) You said that some things you think help are actually making the problem worse, and it's not so clear sometimes what makes it worse and what makes it better. The last two people I work with on this problem both feel that heat is important. I would put it in a very warm water 2 or 3 times for five minutes each time. I don't know if this helps or not, though it does feel better after doing this. So now I am only frustrated in the sense that I want to get over the final hurdle where I don't have pain anymore. I am in my late fifties but look in my 40's and am very fit. I was doing an extreme workout (DVD) for a month and that seemed to create the problem, though there may have been a weakness there before and this workout made the problem appear finally. Anyway, if you have any further suggestions please let me know. Otherwise, I thank you so much for having this website up!! drew
03.06.11 Dear Drew. Thanks for your email. You will get better soon by stretching and start now the "hanging on the door bar" see descrition on my homepage. This will speed things up fast! Don't look for the reason why you got it, muscle cramps (and its just that) in different bodyparts start after 35, that's normal. The stretching will solve it. Keep on keeping on and let me know in 6-8 weeks how you improved. God bless you, Thomas


Rudolf Koelman Winterthur <koelman@bluewin.ch>
Eintrag vom Dienstag, 16. Januar 2007, 16.20 Uhr:

Fantastic, I am a Dutch violinist and violinprofessor 47 years of age, living and working in Switzerland. I have had 5 months unbearable pains during playing and teaching the violin, sleeping, shopping, carrying stuf etc. I tryed everything, massages, several creams, warmth, cold but it did all not help much. Last week I came across your site and started immidiately with the stretch exersizes and I still had a old "hanging bar" in the sellar wich I installed in the door to my buro. Already after one week I slept the last 2 nights painfree! When I do the stretch exersize a big pain comes after I move the arm upwards but with hanging right after I feel that pain fading away in seconds! Also after exersizing and a warm bath I feel totally pain free for a while!? I made a link to your website from my website www.koelman.ch at the bottom of meisterkurse or masterclasses "with special thanks to" because I think a lot of musician friends and (former)pupils of mine can realy benefit a whole lot from your cure of a real big problem especialy in our profession! Many thanks, and best wishes, Rudolf Koelman

In Dutch: Geweldig, ik ben violist 47 jaar oud en heb al 5 maanden heel erg last (ondragelijke pijn tijdens slapen, wandelen, iets oppakken etc. tot ik vorige week op jullie site terecht kwam en meteen begonnen ben met de rekoefeningen en het "aan de stang hangen" ik nl. had nog zo'n ding liggen! Ik heb deze week al 2 nachten zonder pijn geslapen, en ik voel ook een snel wegtrekken van de pijn na de rek oefeningen als ik meteen daarna ca. 30 sec. aan die stang ga hangen. Ook s'avonds (b.v. na een warm bad en oefeningen)ben ik soms zelfs geheel vrij van pijn!? Ik heb jullie site op mijn website www.koelman.ch onderaan masterclasses of meisterkurse "with special thanks to" verlinkt want ik denk dat heel wat vrienden musici en (oud)leerlingen van mij hier wat aan zullen hebben!
17.01.07, 11.59h Dear Rudolf. Thank you very much for your positive and motivating feedback. I'm very pleased to have helped. The link on your homepage is perfect, I hope it will help distribute this knowledge further and heal many suffering friends of yours and others. Tell it others whenever you see somebody walking around with an armbandage or armbrace etc. Many musicians have benefited from my stretching suggestions so far, also professionals (mostly guitar, drums etc.). As any good fitness- or sports-trainer teaches his students the very important strechting before and after any session to avoid injury and physical consequences, it should be taught in music school, university or conservatory as a regular part of the exercise and curiculum. The hanging on the horizontal bar also improve your posture, (make you taller too) and do away with any backpain or avoid it in the beginning! It's the best exercise I know of and its even painless and passive! Now just continue with the stretching whenever you remember. Your experience with the pain coming and going sounds all normal during stretching, you will improve further soon. Chances are (statistics show that), in the coming 5-7 years you could develop a tennisarm on the other arm or/and golferarms (I had all 4 ...) When you will feel a symptom you will eventually remeber, then start the stretching and the improvment comes much faster than the first time because it will not build up a pain memory in the brain which sometimes signals the pain symptom for some weeks eventhough the cause of the pain has been gone. God bless you and your whole family and best regards, Thomas


Ed, Vancouver
Eintrag vom Sonntag, 10. September 2006, 08.21 Uhr:

Thank you very much for your suggestions. I have 'golfer elbow' for a month and I have been stretching it and doing some light weights. It made me feel better after my badminton sessions, but wasn't sure if it would work in long term, until I saw your webpage. Actually I did my stretching similar to your recommendation for the golfer elbow, only I have my arms behind my back - but now I will do as your photo suggests. Thank you. Ed.
11.09.06, 12.50h Dear Ed. Perfect what you did. You can also do the same stretching behind your back, I advise that one if you walk around since it does not look so obvious or strange. Continue and in some weeks you will be perfect and do it only once in a while. Just before any practice or playing that has the potential to make that muscle cramping again, do a bit more of stretching before, inbetween and after. Have fun playing and God bless you and best regards, Thomas


Geert de Bruin, Rotterdam <gmdebruin@tiscali.nl>
Eintrag vom Freitag, 22. Oktober 2004, 14.53 Uhr:

I suffered real pain from my tennis elbow. In august, when I was on holiday, I could hardly pick up something, which was a real disaster because we stayed on campings. After I came back I found this site and I started immediately doing the excercises. I felt relief after one day already and the pain was almost gone after one week. Every now and then I do the excercises, but most of te time I forget it because I hardly feel pain anymore. I'm so happy I found this site!! The hardest part for me was to use my arm instead of giving it rest, because I was afraid it might get worse. I found out that I could do almost every daily thing except carrying heavy bags. I recommend these exercises to everone!!!
23.10.04, 12.59h Dear Geert, I guess (no of course I know) God loves you. I mean you are a rare case because you knew what your problem was called, you started looking for a solution very fast, found the right cure right away and got healed in a few days. I'm glad for you. Because you were so fast, the pain could not build a "memory" yet, which is harder to get rid of. Most here suffer anywhere from 6 months to many years and the the healing process takes mostly 4 weeks to 4 months. Now you know what to do when the pain wants to come back and you will always get fast relief. I wish you good health and all the best, Thomas


Sjak van Hoesel, Eindhoven/Holland sjakvanhoesel@freeler.nl
Email of 26.08.02, 01.04 Uhr
My English is better than my Deutsch. But I read your website, I did immediatly believed in it. Because it contained all the information from all other websites I could find. In 2 weeks I lost my problems and even after 3 weeks I have no complains. I will follow your instruktions for at least two months to stay rid of the problem. Now I am so pleased with your website I have two suggestion: 1. Publish your website in a book. 2. If you want to have a translation of it in Dutch, please contact me (free of charge). Just want to help as you did me. Thanks thanks thanks, Sjak van Hoesel
Sjak did translate the homepage to dutch! Click, then choose from the index!


Martin Wiemers, Port Moresby (Papua New Guinea) <Btennisarm@BwiemBersB1.de>
Eintrag vom Montag, 22. Dezember 2003, 00.37 Uhr:

Your method saved my life! I am 37 years old and was diagnosed with epicondylitis after intensive use of a computer trackball and suffered from numbness and pain in the hands, especially after computer use. Doctors did not know a cure. Eventually I found your website and tried your method. It worked and I can only recommend it to anyone with symptoms of epicondylitis (= tennis arm = mouse arm) which might also have been diagnosed as RSI (repetitive strain injury). I am now able to control the symptoms which recur only when I forget to exercise your method. A few minutes every day is usually enough but in case of intensive hand use (e.g. computer mouse or car driving) the exercise needs to be employed more often. Details of my history: I noticed the problem in September 2002 when I suddenly had an intense pain in my right hand after very intensive clicking and dragging with a computer pointing device (trackball) which was required by the software I used to edit DNA sequences. Only much later I realized that mild symptoms had already appeared many months earlier but the numbness and tingling sensations in my hands when waking up in the morning had been wrongly attributed to other causes (e.g. hardness of mattress). I consulted an orthopaedic doctor who diagnosed epicondylitis and did not suggest any cure because the symptoms would disappear on their own. They actually did within three days, but reappeared after using a computer (especially after the use of a mouse or trackball). Therefore I refrained from using a computer although this severely affected my work. Instead I did some work in the lab which included grinding muscle tissue for DNA analysis with a mortar (which I had done before many times). The next day I suffered from severe pain, numbness and tingling sensations in both hands which also affected everyday life. I was not even able to open a bottle or a door without pain. Only after ten days the symptoms disappeared. I consulted other doctors but they could not detect the cause and did not know a cure. I talked to people with similar symptoms who had been diagnosed with RSI (=repetitive strain injury). One of them had to give up his job as a computer programmer despite consulting many different specialist doctors and trying many different treatments. After two years of suffering he was glad to be able to use the computer again for a mere 20 minutes a day. I searched the internet and read several books on RSI (purchased in the USA), but did not find a cure although it appeared to me that the unbalanced use of my hands due to computer use might be the root of the problem. Therefore I started a regular swimming exercise. This improved my general condition and helped to resolve muscle spasms but the hand symptoms reappeared after computer use or longer car drive and I would not even think of using a screw driver. My future started to look dim. I would not be able to finish my phD thesis (on which I had worked for the past four years) without the use of a computer (and hand writing is even worse). My grant funding had already expired, i.e. I was unemployed, and my job prospects would be reduced to become a guard or receptionist, not very thrilling for a scientist. I tried to substitute my hands but the use of a head mouse caused severe back aches. I tried to use voice recognition software but this caused a deterioration of my voice. You only notice how important your hands are when you can not use them the way you are used to. Finally I was lucky to find your web site. I started to try your stretching exercise immediately because your explanations made sense. And it worked! With the help of your method I regained full use of my hands within a few days. I also noticed now the muscle spasms in my right under arm. I found that a gentle self-massage for an extended period of time (ca 30-60 minutes) would reduce the muscle spasms but they would return quickly without enough stretching exercise. Your method saved my life! Within three months only I managed to write my thesis (200 pages) and immediately afterwards I started my current profession in my field of expertise. I am now used to apply your method regularly (for about one minute every hour) when working with the computer. But other activities (like extended car driving) can also strain the arm muscles and if I forget the exercise then, mild symptoms (like temporary numbness of fingers when waking up in the morning) can reappear reminding me to apply the stretching exercise again. “Tennis arm” symptoms appear to become more and more common nowadays due to intensive use of pointing devices (internet, computer games, mobile phones) and I would like to encourage everybody who is straining his/her arms more than usual to apply this exercise, the earlier the better, even without having symptoms (because stretching can do no harm!) It is amazing that modern medicine can handle the most complicated organ transplants but hardly any doctor knows how to treat and prevent one of the most common muscular disorders, even though the treatment is so simple. Great many thanks for your web site! I hope it will save many people from suffering with symptoms of tennis arm syndrome. In an effort to make your web site more international I am writing this report in English (even though I am German). Martin (cut out all ‘B’ characters in the email above / Spam)
27.12.03, 12.59h. This sounds wonderful Martin and very encouraging for others. I'm glad to have been a part of the success of the treatment. You did and do the right thing to keep the problem on a low level. You will see, within a year you can even forget about the stretching because you will get a "burn out" and all pain will be gone like a night mare. Wishing you all the best and God bless you in 2004. Thomas

Dr. Martin Wiemers, Wien <tennis*arm(at)wiemers1.de>
Eintrag vom Sonntag, 23. September 2007, 23.14 Uhr
Lieber Thomas, seit meinem (englischsprachigen) Eintrag vom 22.12.2003 sind nun schon fast vier Jahre vergangen. Daher möchte ich heute gerne meine Langzeiterfahrung mit Deiner Methode, die damals meine berufliche Zukunft gerettet hat, zurückmelden. (Als ich damals mit 37 Jahren mehr als ein halbes Jahr lang gravierende Probleme mit meinem Tennisarm hatte, wußten die Ärzte keine Behandlungsmöglichkeit, aber mit Deiner Methode sind die Symptome innerhalb nur weniger Tage verschwunden.) Seit der Anwendung Deiner Dehn-Methode habe ich keine gravierenden Probleme mit meinem "Tennisarm" (bei mir eigentlich: "Mausarm") mehr gehabt. Allerdings hatte ich in den ersten Monaten gelegentlich leichte Rückfälle, nachdem ich längere Zeit keine Dehnübungen mehr gemacht hatte. Die Symptome gingen aber nach Anwendung der Dehnübungen schnell wieder zurück. Seit 2-3 Jahren bin ich beschwerdefrei, obwohl ich die Dehnübungen nur noch gelegentich durchführe. Nur ganz selten habe ich morgens beim Aufstehen ein leichtes Kribbeln in den Fingern, was mich wieder an die Dehnübungen erinnert. Ich möchte Dir daher nochmal ein ganz dickes Dankeschön sagen, und ich freue mich sehr, dass Deine Webseite und auch das Forum weiterhin existiert und schon so vielen Leuten dadurch geholfen werden konnte. Es ist auch erfreulich, dass Links zu Deiner Seite inzwischen mehrfach im Internet zu finden sind, u.a. in Wikipedia. Allerdings mußte ich bei Wikipedia auch feststellen, dass Hinweise zu Deiner Methode mit der Begründung entfernt worden sind, dass keine wissenschaftlichen Quellen für deren Wirksamkeit genannt seien. Ich habe daraufhin etwas recherchiert und war überrascht, dass es leider auch heute noch keine wissenschaftlich anerkannten Erhebungen zum Erfolg Deiner Methode zu geben scheint, wahrscheinlich, weil man damit kein Geld verdienen kann, wie Du schreibst. Stattdessen werden weiterhin zahlreiche sinnlose Therapien verschrieben. Also sollten wir alle, die mit Deiner Methode geheilt wurden, uns weiter für deren Verbreitung einsetzen! Vielleicht findet sich ja dann doch noch ein Arzt, dem es nicht ums Geld geht, und der eine geeignete Reihenuntersuchung durchführt, damit Deine Methode auch in die ärztliche Praxis Eingang findet! Zum Schluss möchte ich noch auf ein anderes Gesundheitsproblem für Computer-Anwender hinweisen, für das ich durch Zufall eine Lösung gefunden habe. Im Jahr 2004 hatte ich nämlich gravierende Augenbeschwerden, bei denen mir verschiedene Ärzte nicht helfen konnten. Durch Zufall habe ich nach über einem Jahr herausgefunden, dass diese durch Verwendung von (korrekt eingestellten!) CRT-Bildschirmen in Verbindung mit Leuchtstofflampen (bzw. Energiesparlampen) hervorgerufen wurden. Wahrscheinlich liegt das an der unterschiedlichen Flimmerfrequenz beider Lichtquellen. Zwar gibt es vereinzelte Hinweise auf diese Problematik im Internet, aber den meisten Ärzten und Ergonomen scheint dieser Zusammenhang nicht bekannt zu sein. Wer also Augenbeschwerden bei der Bildschirmarbeit hat, sollte entweder mal die Lichtquelle austauschen (Glühbirne oder Halogenlicht statt Fluoreszenzlicht) oder den Bildschirm (LCD statt CRT) und schauen, ob es dann besser wird! Nochmal vielen, vielen Dank an Thomas und allen Lesern eine gute Gesundheit! Martin.
24.09.07, 17.17h Lieber Martin. Vielen Dank für das positive Feedback und die Langzeitmeldung. Danke auch für die Tipps betreffend Augen/Leuchtstoff/Bildschirm. Freut mich sehr geholfen zu haben. Sag es weiter, allen die Du daran leiden siehst. Sollte sich in den kommenden 2-6 Jahren dann mal der andere Arm und/oder ein Golfarm melden (Wahrscheinlichkeit besteht), weisst Du ja schon wie dehnen und hast es noch schneller im Griff. Ich wünsche Dir und Deiner ganzen Familie weiterhin gute Gesundheit und Gottes Segen. Viele Grüsse von Thomas

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Tennisarm / Tenniselbow / epicondylitis / Epikondylitis / Golferarm / Golfarm / Sehnenscheiden-Entzündung / Knochenhaut-Entzündung / RSI-Syndrom / Mausarm