Ankle Tendonitis

We, human beings dwelling in the modern world are so much engulfed in our daily lives, that we hardly get time to look towards our health and fitness. Unfortunate, but we need to accept this fact! Today, when health problems such as, excessive weight gain and obesity have already gained pace, there are also other health issues which are rapidly encroaching our lives! One such problem is ankle tendonitis. Well, actually this is not a very serious condition, if one treats it promptly. However, an ignorance towards its treatment and exercises might aggravate the condition, affecting your lifestyle up to a considerable extent.

To understand ankle tendonitis, you need to understand the structure of human foot. The human foot is made of several muscles and ligaments. Some of these are tibia, achilles tendon, calcaneus, tibialis posterior and posterior tibialis tendon. Ankle tendonitis is a condition which leads to inflammation in the posterior tibialis tendon. People with a flat foot are more prone to this condition. Posterior tibialis tendon plays an important role in lifting the foot arch. It is mostly caused due to exerting undue stress on the posterior tibialis tendon. Apart from posterior tibial tendonitis, there are two more types of ankle tendonitis. They are, peroneal tendonitis and achilles tendonitis, which affect the peroneal tendon and achilles tendon respectively. It is not only undue stress that leads to this problem, there are some more causes for it.
Causes of Ankle Tendonitis

Like I said before, ankle tendonitis is mainly of three types, achilles tendonitis, posterior tibial tendonitis and peroneal tendonitis. Therefore, the causes for all the three types are given below.

• Achilles Tendonitis: Ankle tendonitis and running have been linked together for a long time. The reason behind this is that, most of the time, excessive use of achilles tendon, during walking or running can result in achilles tendonitis. Jumping is another reason for ankle tendonitis, as jumping tends to put a lot of pressure on achilles tendonitis. Sometimes, arthritis is also observed to be the reason for this type of tendonitis.
• Posterior Tibial Tendonitis : Most of the reasons for posterior tibial tendonitis are similar to the earlier form of ankle tendonitis. However, a severe injury to the posterior tibialis tendon, or improper walking style can also lead to posterior tibial tendonitis.
• Peroneal Tendonitis: The causes of peroneal tendonitis are a bit different from the earlier two. The most common ones are ankle or foot twisting and tightness in the calf muscles. Yet, injury and excessive use of ankle are also the causes of peroneal tendonitis.

Treatment of Ankle Tendonitis

Treatmen intends to decrease the inflammation in the affected part and relieve the person from pain. Many a time, simple tips followed at home can prove useful in relieving you from the condition. However, for serious or advanced cases, an ankle tendonitis surgery might be prescribed. Some of the commonly followed treatments are, taking anti-inflammatory medicines, avoid activities such as running and walking or movements that are leading to pain and resuming the activity slowly, once the pain starts reducing. You can actually prevent ankle tendonitis by avoiding undue stress on the ankle, warming up before running, avoid quick and sudden movements of the ankle and by wearing appropriate footwear for different activities. Another important way of preventing ankle tendonitis is to perform appropriate exercises. Ankle strengthening exercises, leg strengthening exercises and calves exercises are usually effective for this purpose.

Although not a very serious problem, ankle tendonitis should not be neglected. In fact, you cannot ignore it, as you would experience pain in your ankle, at every step! Consult a doctor for appropriate treatment, as you do not know, how serious the problem is in your case. Hope the above discussion was sufficient enough to get an overview of ankle tendonitis. Take Care!