And here I thought I was the only one who ever had this. Well, it's good that you're patient - it took me about 4 weeks to heal completely. Two things I did to speed it along: First, I told by massage guy and we made sure to treat the area properly (as in not irritate it) and we did some electrostim as well. Second, I went to my chiro a couple of times a week (usually I go bi-weekly) to make sure my hips were in perfect alignment (which took stress off of that area).

Good luck, and just think how much faster you'll be in the water!

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"To give less than your best is to sacrifice the gift." - Pre

MattMizenko.com

First I'll state my bias: I would never, ever get a cortisone shot in any body part. Personal thing, from horror stories working as an athletic trainer. But that's me.

I had bursitis in my hip a couple of months ago, very much aggravated by prolonged sitting (which I do at work) and with a 12 hour flight coming up I needed to get rid of it. I had a series of A.R.T. treatment at the sports med clinic and I've been pain free for nearly a month, including four long plane trips with lots of sitting. The treatments were a little painful at the time, but I was amazed at how well it worked.

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clm
Nashville, TN
https://twitter.com/ironclm | http://ironclm.typepad.com

I usually treat them with electrotherapy or laser accupuncture to the immediate area as well as chiropractic adjustments to the sacro-iliac and pelvic area to keep things as functional as possible. Just take it easy for a little while and it should clear up.

I second the notion of the ART or myofascial release of the iliotibial band and hip abductors. You definitely want to give it a couple of weeks post coritsone injection to let the medication work. It would be worth having a physical therapist, athletic therapist, or chiropractor take a look at your low back, pelvis and legs. They may pick up some biomechanical faults that may have contributed to the problem. This may require direct treatment and/or they should provide you with a stretching regime to help correct the deviations. The cortisone may help settle the bursitis (assuming he diagnosed it correctly) but you are best to try to determine and correct the factors that resulted in the conditions onset.

Never had a cortisone injection, but I've had several patients with postive experiences with it (none had trochanteric bursitis though). I've had several with no significant response one way or the other. As long as the physician is judicious in his/her approach to use of cortisone I don't think people should be too apprehensive. Local cortisone injection is better on the liver than oral medication as a cortisone injection remains pretty local to the tissues being injected (ie it doesn't distribute through the body as greatly as an oral inflammatory). However, I would personally see a sports physician or physiatrist (a doctor specialized in physical medicine) if I was trying to evaluate the need for a cortisone injection.

Although I've had trochanteric bursitis and it improved with deep massage and changing running style, I wouldn't say that "cortisone" is such a terrible thing in this area either, in someone not improving with other techniques.

Everyone calls it cortisone, though almost no one actually injects cortisone anymore - there are antiinflammatory steroids designed not to travel from where they're put, and that's actually what's used. They have no systemic effects like osteoporosis, liver problems... that's predisone or other systemic steroids.

Saying that you would never have a steroid injection anywhere ever is a little like saying that you'd never have surgery for a muskuloskeletal problem ever - might be true for your back pain, but if you have a broken femur, you'd probably need it. What part of the body, how it's put in and how many times are the key things, but in the trochanteric bursa, there is no tendon to rupture or weaken (the main objection to localised steroid), so a single injection is pretty harmless.

Deke

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Deke