Good Results with Painful Eccentric Calf Muscle Training for Patients with Painful Midportion Achilles Tendinosis-Implications for New Treatments

Håkan Alfredson

Abstract

Chronic painful tendons were previously considered to be treated with more or less pain-free rehabilitation exercises. These tendons were considered “degenerative and weak”, and should be handled carefully. The concept of painful eccentric loading for the chronic painful midportion Achilles was started by a co-incidence, and the successful clinical results were unexpected. This is a short review about painful eccentric training-the Umeå modeland how the results of this treatment model broke the ice for new research, research findings providing a basis for inventions of new successful treatment methods.