So, I fucked up my shoulder in Korea, got an MRI at a local hospital there, turns out I have a torn rotator cuff...yay.

It's been about 6 weeks since my MRI, shoulder is still fucking up, so it turns out I might get surgery. Anyone ever have this done, if so whats the recovery time? At least I might get a free trip to Germany.

9/15/2009 12:43:49 PM

i've heard rotator cuff surgery suuuuuuucks big time.

[Edited on September 15, 2009 at 1:09 PM. Reason : ]

9/15/2009 1:09:32 PM

^Yeah I've heard the same thing.

Sorry man

9/15/2009 1:11:46 PM

I opted not to have surgery. it bothers me every now and then when the scar tissue rolls over something in a weird way, but otherwise its fine. did they say you needed surgery or just recommend it?

9/15/2009 1:32:06 PM

I also feel your pain


Never had a tear, but i have really bad rotator cuff tendinitis. It's so bad that I can't even throw a football back and forth without paying for it with excruciating pain for the next couple of weeks. I've had many doctors look at it, and all of them indicated that surgery *might* fix it, but the amount of PT and pain involved may not be worth it if the payoff is only being able to play rec league softball and throwing a football around.

One doctor asked me if I do lat pulldowns where I pull the bar behind my neck. I used to do this for years as instructed by my high school weightlifting coach, but then was taught differently when i took weight lifting in college. Anyway, the doctor suggested that the behind-the-neck technique may be the origin of the problem.

either way, rotator cuff problems fucking SUCK

9/15/2009 1:33:03 PM

THis has worked wonders for my shoulder:
http://intensemuscle.com/6997-how-cure-shoulder-problems-trust-me-will-do-90-time.html

9/15/2009 2:02:49 PM

^ If I'm reading that correctly he is talking about doing "shoulder dislocates"...The first stretch in this vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odZuUgf47cs Correct?

9/15/2009 2:30:20 PM

shoulder dislocates are great for breaking up scar tissue and increase ROM/flexibility in the shoulder joint

9/15/2009 2:56:32 PM

My fiances mother had the surgury. She is now better then before it was screwed up.
She did the physical therapy like it was as neccessary as air, or even more so.

I will probably need the surgury later, but at this point the docs say mine is a 'might' improve your shoulder.

9/15/2009 4:21:48 PM

I started throwing curveballs way too young and got scoped after my my junior year of high school

Not a big deal...I could throw with the same velocity but I could never get the same movement

And my arm got sore a lot more quickly...senior year I came out of the bullpen

Yeah... Coach woulda put me in the last inning, we would've been state champions. No doubt. No doubt in my mind.

9/15/2009 4:35:45 PM

most people need 2-3 months of physical therapy after surgery to get it back to normal. those tears aren't anything to screw around with, so if it's a pretty severe tear, i'd probably recommend surgery. my wife lived with pain for 7 years before finally getting surgery, and she's as good as new now

9/15/2009 4:57:02 PM

good luck with that. ive got tendonitis in my right rotator cuff. some shit about the way my shoulder bones are shaped makes it all retarded.

9/15/2009 5:53:05 PM

i just came in here to post that i have pretty bad shoulder issues as well. like someone above mentioned, if i throw the football around for a bit (say, at a tailgate or something) my shoulder is in pain for days afterward. i'm not sure if i have a torn rotator cuff or just tendinitis, but i'm sure it's one of the two. i can also pop my shoulder over and over again.

one thing that definately helped (although i still have minor issues) was buying a heading pad for my shoulder and icing it repeatedly throughout the day. i did both about twice a day for a month, and noticed an improvement. i've recently stopped, and the problems are minimal, but still there.

http://www.aidmyrotatorcuff.com/?REF=GRotatorCuff is a good site for general info.

i bought this heating pad for my shoulder (http://shop.aidmyrotatorcuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=126&osCsid=de4kcgpvsvcaolo15t44g9ra07) and used it about twice a day for a month (and i still use it occasionally). I'm not sure this is any more "advanced" than a regular heating pad, but it feels good when you use it.

if i had the money, i would consider buying the ultrasound to help break up any scar tissue that i have, but that investment will have to hold off for a while.


so, my cheap and dirty recommendation to anyone with shoulder injuries is a combo of heat/ice which will dull the pain. the stretching recommendations look solid too, and i'll probably be incorporating that into my shoulder treatment.

[Edited on September 18, 2009 at 5:49 PM. Reason : ]

9/18/2009 5:48:35 PM

eww

2/26/2010 9:57:07 AM

Starting in 2004, I've had problems with my shoulders; I'd never thought until recently that it might be anything other than tendinitis.

But recently, my shoulder hurts all the damn time, with me doing nothing to aggravate it, and avoiding a good many activities.

My question: did you ever find that a certain position made your shoulder feel immediately and fantastically better (like, you could even say it felt good), and did you ever have problems with your shoulder falling*?

*I don't know what else to call it: One shoulder is simply lower than the other, and one is not leaning.

I can't go to an orthopedist until May b/c of the insurance company; in the meantime, does anyone have any particular recommendations?

2/26/2010 10:04:02 AM

Three years ago I had an awkward dive on a deflected shot and messed up my right shoulder playing soccer goalie. I went to a sports medicine doctor at Duke and had them examine it and fortunately I only sublexed my shoulder and nothing tore, only some bursitis. With that said, my shoulder still isn't the same. I can't make a backhand motion without worrying that my shoulder is going to very painfully pop out, which it does about half the time. I can't play tennis the same way I used to which is a bit of a bummer cause I never two-handed my backhands. There's physical therapy for it but I'm a little too lazy for non-necessary PT.

I noticed a lot of people talked about tendinitis in this thread, but the source of the dull pain deep inside my shoulder was bursitis. With my injury, I was NOT supposed to stretch out my arm or pull on it, so if your pain hasn't been diagnosed specifically as tendinitis I would be cautious in doing any kind of PT exercises. If the pain is deep in your shoulder, I would guess that some sort of inflammation is the cause, so take some aleve or ibuprofen and see if that alleviates the pain at all.

[Edited on February 27, 2010 at 8:21 PM. Reason : ]

2/27/2010 8:11:44 PM