Cortisone: A Quick Relief Guide to Orthopedic’s Most Common Injection I injured my hip entering my sophomore year of high school. I was a top ranked discus thrower and although I managed to get off one great throw during an early in the season meet, my distances quickly diminished after reinsuring my hip in practice. Running became difficult, and soon enough, I was hardly able to train due to the discomfort in my hip. My primary care physician referred me to Dr. Slattery at Washington Orthopedic Center, and after exploring different options Dr. Slattery and I decided to move ahead with a cortisone injection. Now I won’t say the injection was a miracle worker; I didn’t make state that year in discus nor did my pain vanish. However, the cortisone did give my body the advantage it needed to overcome the chronic inflammation in my hip and make a return to full sport participation in the following years. That’s what cortisone does; it provides a kick-start of sorts to prevent an overactive recovery system. To understand what a cortisone injection does, you first need to understand inflammation. Perhaps the most popular term in health sciences right now, inflammation in the product of [...]