De Quervain's disease is a common clinical disorder, characterized by pain at radial side of the wrist. It often interferes wrist and thumb movement, and may affect activity of daily life. It is caused by overuse and impaired gliding of the abductor pollicis longus (APL) and extensor policis brevis (EPB) tendons at the styloid process of the radius. It is associated with postpartum baby care, or jobs or hobbies that involve repetitive hand and wrist motions. The most effective treatment is corticosteroid injection into the tendon sheath of the conjoined tendons of APL and EPB. Over the past few years because of advancement of sonography in the musculoskeletal system, ultrasound (US)-guided intra-sheath injection has become popular, and it has been proved to improve the accuracy of placement of needle tip in the tendon sheath, however, studies comparing the effect and side effects of US-guided corticosteroid injection with palpation-guided injection for de Quervain's disease have never been reported before. The purposes of this study are to compare the effectiveness and side effects of US-guided and palpation-guided corticosteroid injections for de Quervain's disease.~The investigators plan to recruit 70 patients with de Quervain's disease, half of them will be randomly assigned into US-guided injection group, and the other half into the palpation-guided injection group. Each subject will receive one shot of injection and each subject will expect to fill in the evaluation form at baseline, and at 1 week, 3 months, and 6 months after the injection. Statistics will be performed after completing the patients' treatment and evaluations.
The purposes of this study are to compare the effectiveness and side effects of US-guided and palpation-guided corticosteroid injections for de Quervain's disease.