Blog Archive
Everyone with a hurt shoulder, raise your hand. Wait..you can’t. Shoulder injuries are common. This highly mobile joint is housed in a shallow socket, held in place by numerous muscles, tendons, and ligaments, any or all of which can be stretched, torn, or injured. About a quarter of people in...
Your knee's anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) stabilizes it so you can run, jump, and stop during play. Unfortunately, the ACL is susceptible to tears. In fact, ACL tears are one of the most common sports injuries. About one in every 3,500 people in the United States tear their ACL each...
The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered dramatic changes throughout everyday life — and in the medical community as well. Not only are providers across the country postponing elective procedures, but many are also encouraging people to avoid in-office appointments to reduce their risk of exposure to this highly contagious coronavirus.But what...
When you’re on the road with your team, you may not have access to a top-notch sports medicine facility or highly trained physical therapist when your traveling baseball players experience injuries. But you still want that player back in the game as soon as possible. For minor injuries, the acronyms...
Throwing injuries, particularly those of the elbow, are common in pitchers. Both overuse injuries and trauma may cause a bone spur to develop on your elbow. Bone spurs are smooth lumps of bone that grow near or in a joint. Your body creates bone spurs in response to an injury/stress...
Only about 1-2% of the general population experiences shoulder dislocation. That said, you’re at greater risk if you're an athlete. Shoulder instability usually affects athletes who exert powerful forces on their shoulders. Pitchers, for instance, are prone to this injury. You’re also at risk for shoulder instability if you play...
Whether your kid wants to be the next Coco Gauff or Lionel Messi, you want to support them in every way possible. With 25 million scholastic sports programs in the United States plus another 20 million community-based programs, there is plenty of opportunity to participate in athletics. But so is...
It’s tempting to let your skills slide during the off-season without practice and games. But what you don’t do today sets up what happens tomorrow — including sports injuries that could take you out of the game entirely. So, how do you stay strong, flexible, and fit without the inspiration of an...
Professional athletes, school athletes, and weekend warriors must be aware of how they treat their bodies. In addition to relying on strong muscles and bones, they need to keep their joints protected and lubricated. One way to do that is to pay attention to what they eat. Although various diets...
Whether you’ve broken a bone or undergone reconstructive surgery on your elbow, hand, or shoulder, when your arm is in a cast due to sports injuries, your workouts are a challenge. But even if you’re not an athlete, it’s essential to stay active as your arm heals. Keeping the rest of...
Basketball demands agility, speed, and strength. The quickness of the game, plus its tendency toward sudden stops, cuts, and pivots that are part of each change of direction, exposes your knees to danger. While blown-out knees can be repaired with patellar stabilization or meniscus repair from our experts, the better...
Tommy John surgery is named for the Major League Baseball (MLB) pitcher who first underwent the corrective procedure to repair his torn ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) in the elbow. Although Tommy John surgery gets you back in the game, your best bet is to avoid surgical repair altogether. Recovery from...
All athletics and sports carry the risk of injury, and the shoulder is particularly vulnerable. Your shoulder joint is highly mobile and exposed to extreme stresses, especially if you throw or swing with great force during your game. Your shoulder is also a complex joint, with many tendons, ligaments, and...
While some consider baseball a relatively leisurely sport to watch, it is anything but. It takes a dazzling mix of strength, flexibility, and coordination. And the pitcher is the most active player on the team. Every game, a starting pitcher delivers 80-100 pitches at maximum or near-maximum effort. The pitch...
About 1-3% of adults develop tennis elbow every year. Approximately half of all tennis players eventually develop tennis elbow, but any athlete or worker who uses heavy tools or must lift and grasp continually is at risk. Tennis elbow develops in the tendons on the outside of your elbow. Usually, it affects your dominant...
More than a third of injuries in athletes occur in the wrist, elbow, or shoulder. And among shoulder injuries, about a third are due to accidents, overuse, or poor form during sports. Once you injure your shoulder, you’re likely to injure it again. A consequence of a shoulder injury can...
Chronic pain is a part of life for many women, men, and children, including professional athletes. Imperfectly healed injuries, joints worn down from osteoarthritis, or misalignments in the body can cause aches and pains that never resolve and may become debilitating. Acute pain occurs when you’re injured or undergo surgery....
When you’re an athlete or live an active life, you’re at risk for a meniscus tear. These C-shaped cartilage discs absorb shocks in your knee joint and are easily torn. How easy is it? About 14% of women, men, and kids in the United States have torn their meniscus. Although anyone can...
Tommy John surgery gets its name from the first athlete who successfully underwent the procedure. Tommy John was a Major League Baseball pitcher from 1963-1989. In 1974, John tore the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) in his elbow, which could have ended his career. Instead, Dr. Frank Jobe, team physician for...
Whether you are a professional or amateur, you had to work hard and condition your body to make a sports team. And during the game, your adrenalin pumps, and you push yourself to the limits. Occasionally, you pull a muscle or injure a joint. When it happens, it is called...
The rotator cuff is a set of muscles and their corresponding tendons that keep the ball of your shoulder joint in its socket. A rotator cuff injury is often the cause, or result of, shoulder instability. Another common cause of shoulder instability is an acute trauma to the shoulder that dislocates...
Tears to the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) are so common that one in 3,500 women, men, and children in the United States experience an ACL tear each year. Female athletes are up to eight times more likely than male athletes to tear their ACL due to anatomical and hormonal differences that affect body mechanics....
Approximately 30 million children and teenagers participate in sports in the United States. Each year there are over 3.5 million injuries. Professional athletes have an annual injury incidence of 2,000 per every 10,000 players. If you’re a professional athlete, or if your child plays sports, an injury is almost an inevitability. The first...
The rotator cuff is a semicircle of muscles, tendons, and ligaments that hold your shoulder in place and keep it stable whenever you raise or rotate it. If you’ve torn your rotator cuff and it hasn’t responded to more conservative therapies, your only option may be surgical rotator cuff repair. David...
Injuries to the elbow in your pitching arm are common at all levels of play, from Little League to Major League Baseball. In fact, pitchers were injured at an alarming rate in the early days of the pandemic thought to be due to stops and starting in training and a...
About 14% of the women, men, and children in the United States have torn one of their menisci — crescent-shaped pieces of cartilage that absorb shocks to protect your thigh and shin bones. In each knee, you have two menisci — the lateral meniscus on the outside of your knee,...
Tennis elbow is the layperson’s name for a condition called lateral epicondylitis. If you have tennis elbow, your extensor carpi radialis brevis — the tendon that anchors your forearm muscle to the outside of your elbow — is weak, injured, or inflamed. The extensor carpi radialis brevis helps extend and...
Tears in the knee’s anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), are one of the most common injuries among athletes, including kids and teens who play sports. The ACL is a tough band of flexible tissue that holds together the bones in your knee, so it stays stable when you flex, bend, or...
Tommy John became a household name because of his stellar record as a Major League Baseball pitcher. In 1974 — 11 years after he made it to the major leagues — he ripped the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) in his elbow while pitching against the Montreal Expos. That torn UCL...
The knee is one of the largest joints in the body and also one of the most active. Even when you’re sitting down, you still use your knees. And if you play high-impact sports, you’re at greater risk of injuring your knees. One of the most common types of knee...
Every time you bend or flex your knee, your knee cap (patella) slides up and down in its own dedicated groove. However, a blow to the knee, an injury, or overly loose or tight ligaments may cause the kneecap to lose its groove, moving either slightly or completely outside its...
Even though your shoulder moves in many directions along a shallow socket, a stable shoulder stays in place. If you have shoulder instability, however, the head of your humerus (i.e. the ball part of your upper arm) can slide out of the socket, either completely or partially. As head team...
Athletes and weekend warriors put a lot of stress on their knees. But let’s face it: knees get a workout and stress no matter who you are, just from the daily activities of life. That’s why there are up to 200,000 anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears each year in the...
Tennis elbow is an injury to the tendons and muscles that allow your elbow to flex and straighten. You can develop tennis elbow by straining or overusing the elbow joint through such activities as: Playing tennis Swinging a bat Hammering Painting Playing musical instruments Carpentry Chopping and cutting while cooking...
The shoulder labrum is a rubbery ring of cartilage that stabilizes your shoulder joint. The labrum surrounds the rim of your glenoid, the “socket” part of your shoulder joint much like w washer or gasket. The labrum creates more depth in the glenoid, which keeps the humerus (the “ball” on...
Athletes who throw hard are at high risk for tearing the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL), which is located on the inside of your elbow. If you tear your UCL, you may need to replace it with a graft from elsewhere in your body — a procedure known as Tommy John...
Your kneecap, also known as a patella, is a disc-shaped bone that slides back and forth in the center of your knee each time you bend or flex your leg at the knee. It is attached to your thighbone (femur) and shinbone (tibia) with tendons. When your patella slips or...
As your most mobile and flexible joint, your shoulder is also susceptible to injury, dislocation, and instability. An unstable shoulder can cause pain and limits your ability to play at your best. And with severe shoulder instability, you may not even be able to play at all. David Lintner, MD...
You want your child to explore their interests fully and passionately. But you also want them to stay safe and free of injury. So when your son or daughter tells you that they want to play a sport that raises their risk for concussion, you feel torn. When 53% of...
High-intensity interval training (HIIT) is all the rage, both in gyms, in online coaching videos, and athletes’ at-home or in-training routines. What is HIIT? How does it work? And why is HITT changing how we work out? David Lintner, MD, an orthopedic and sports medicine specialist in Houston and Baytown,...
I have been embedded with the Astros in their "playoff bubble" for almost a month. While this has been disruptive to my practice, most of my patients have been understanding and excited for the Astros during their playoff run! We are still providing care via telemedicine visits with me while...
Practice makes perfect. Or at least gets you closer to your goals. But because practice in baseball involves making the same motions over and over, it can also cause an injury. If you tore the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) in your elbow, you might wonder if you’ll ever play again....
Almost all adolescents who play sports at the competitive level get injured at least once in a year, according to a study from Sweden’s Karolinska Institute. Even professional athletes — with all of their coaching, practice, and skill — experience about 2,000 injuries per 10,000 players. That puts professional athletics...
Sports and staying active has been a part of your life for as long as you can remember. Playing outdoor games as a kid, hitting a game-winning homerun, pushing your body to the max. You’ve continued with your active spirit throughout your life. Then the country shut down for the...
Every time you suit up to play a sport, you run a risk of getting injured, whether you’re a professional, student athlete, or a weekend warrior. Running, stopping, and jumping puts stress on your knees, which makes meniscus tears one of the most common types of injuries an athlete can...
Thank you to Roland Ramirez, Houston Texans Assistant Athletic Trainer and Director of Rehabilitation for working withHouston Methodist Sports Medicine to assemble this video on Dynamic Warm Up. This is key for preparation, injury prevention, and performance optimization. Dynamic Warmup with Roland Ramirez
Jon Roegele has compiled lots of information about pro players having Tommy John surgery. Though the return to play rate is excellent, we really can’t tell how well these players pitched after their return from surgery. ERA/WHIP/innings pitched/FIP/BB, etc would help tell the story of how well these players actually...
One of our patients, 73 year old L.D. has returned to white water kayaking after finishing her rehab following repair of a large rotator cuff tear. She continues to run Class 4 rapids without pain. She can even put the kayak on top of her car by herself!
Annette Monks has recovered from her shoulder injury and subsequent surgery to become a multiple National Champion in competitive dance. She did her post-operative rehab with Mo at Houston Methodist’s Timmons facility. She says “the shoulder being healed put me over the top!” How about that?!?
Rotator Cuff Repair can be improved by using the patient’s own stem cells to stimulate healing. This is a video of real surgery in which I harvest the patients stem cells from his bone marrow in the same shoulder were I am repairing his rotator cuff. We have the...
Since 2012 Dr. Lintner has been using patients’ own stem cells to augment their healing after shoulder and knee surgery. The results are promising! Click here to see the interview with Channel 13 and Dr. Lintner.
Electronic medical records are growing but they are unwieldy for physicians and not accessible to patients who may want/need to have their records with them as they travel, visit different physicians, etc. Or to simply have your child’s immunization records when you are filling out the summer camp application. ChartSpan...
For the last 18 months I have been taking advantage of the stem cells naturally present in your bone marrow to accelerate my patients healing after... For the last 18 months I have been taking advantage of the stem cells naturally present in your bone marrow to accelerate my patients...
Dr. Lintner is interviewed by KPRC Channel 2 reporter Rachel McNeill regarding how to prepare for sports that involve cutting and jumping. Strength... Dr. Lintner is interviewed by KPRC Channel 2 reporter Rachel McNeill regarding how to prepare for sports that involve cutting and jumping. Strength is important, but you can...
Check out the surgical video of calcific tendonitis of the rotator cuff. http://youtu.be/n4SGhw5hE5U
Want to diagnose an elbow injury? A shoulder injury? After presenting this topic at the Southwest Athletic Trainers Association annual meeting we... Want to diagnose an elbow injury? A shoulder injury? After presenting this topic at the Southwest Athletic Trainers Association annual meeting we have received many requests for a “how to”...
Dr. Lintner is interviewed about preparing for football practice in the heat. It is important to acclimate for the heat by exercising outside BEFORE... Dr. Lintner is interviewed about preparing for football practice in the heat. It is important to acclimate for the heat by exercising outside BEFORE football (...
Field Turf vs Natural Grass in American Journal of Sports Medicine Here is very good article written by other NFL team physicians regrding the injury rates on these popular playing surfaces. The old artifical turf was associated with higher injury rates, but this paper examines the newer type of turf that hopefully...
Core Exercise using Swiss Ball by Dr. Coleman, Houston Astro Strength Coach This is a simple but effective modification to the typical “Dead Bug” exercise routine that helps build oblique strength. This translates to more power with baseball, lacrosse, golf, etc.
Listen to “Faking of injuries in the NFL?”
Dr. David Lintner was named to the US News and World Report list of The Best Doctors in America. Dr. Lintner is the Chief of Sports Medicine at The Methodist Hospital and The Methodist Center for Sports Medicine, the Head Team Physician for the Houston Astros, a Team Orthopedist for...
Listen to Dr. Lintner’s interview on Sports Radio 610 Regarding Heat Illness in Athletes. Avoid Heat Illness in Athletes.
Dr. Lintner is interviewed in Dave Campbell’s 2011 Texas Football magazine article regarding concussions, heat illness, and what Texas is doing to make football safer. Read about it here: 2011 Texas Football-Concussion article
Dr. David Lintner was recently interviewed on the Methodist Minute about how to prevent ski injuries. Listen to the audio from the interview below…Methodist Minute – Safer Skiing
Dr. David Lintner was recently interviewed on Sports Radio 610 about sore knees, especially among “weekend warriors.” Knee pain can be related to age, inflammation along growth plates, stress fractures, or even weight issues. Listen to the audio from the interview below…Play this “Methodist Minute” audio.
Dr. David Lintner was recently interviewed on Sports Radio 610 about Platelet Rich Plasma Injections, which is sometimes referred to as, “blood spinning.” A simple procedure that is completed right in the office, PRP requires drawing blood from the patient and placing it in a centrifuge machine, which separates the...
The first line of treatment for osteoarthritis of the knee aims to relieve pain. Normally, pain relievers such as ibuprofen or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are used, along with physical therapy, applications of a topical analgesic and injections of a corticosteroid. However, some people have a reaction to NSAIDs and...
Glucosamine and Chondroitin Sulfate are over-the-counter nutritional supplements commonly used to treat osteoarthritis. In contrast to many over-the-counter supplements, Glucosamine and Chondroitin Sulfate have been fairly well studied and favorable results have been found by independent researchers. This is in marked contrast to most nutritional supplements where there is no...
Astros fans have seen Doug Brocail pitch many times from the mound. But last May, he made a play for first that took him off the mound for months. “When I hit the bag there was a popping sound and I was in excruciating pain,” said Brocail. At the time,...