Figuring out which of several similar “inflamed / damaged tendon injuries” I’m talking about is tough. Here is what I’ve worked out so far:

• bursitis is injury/damage to the “back” of the elbow: the way I understand it, this is the part of the elbow that rests on the table if you have put your elbow on the table and lean your chin on your hand. It can be caused by striking or a blow to the elbow, as well as the usual “repetitive stress” causes
• Tennis elbow relates to tendons on the “outside” of the elbow below the joint (towards the wrist),
• and golfers elbow is tendons on the “inside” at about the same point on the arm.

Now we get the problem: when they say “inside” and “outside”, what do they really mean?

I finally found a picture that helps here=> http://www.trainerschoice.on.ca/injury-tennis_elbow.php that shows the “posture” of the arm. In the picture, the arm is sort of resting on a table: my bad manners again! In this posture, the “outside” is the part away from the body: that’s where my pain is, so I think my problem is lateral epicondylitis or “tennis elbow”. Funny: you wouldn’t think describing something like this would be hard, but it is!

This site=> http://www.nismat.org/ptcor/tennis_elbow has some discussion of ‘phases’ and appropriate rehabilitative therapy at each phase. I bought one of those straps: basically, as I understand it you adjust the pad so it sits over the “painful” area, which applies pressure there and presumably restricts movement in that area. There is a picture of it at the above site, adjusted for tennis elbow=> http://www.nismat.org/ptcor/tennis_elbow/braceext.jpg/view. I wore it quite a bit for a few days, but I find it sort of uncomfortable for extended wear.