Torn Rotators without surgery

[Zool]

Anyone have any experience? All of my college eligibility is gone, and my pro career never manifested so the doctors aren't super interested in cutting me open to repair a middle aged desk jockey's shoulder.

Has anyone just used PT and how did it turn out?

[wist43]

Anyone have any experience? All of my college eligibility is gone, and my pro career never manifested so the doctors aren't super interested in cutting me open to repair a middle aged desk jockey's shoulder.

Has anyone just used PT and how did it turn out?

I've been walking around with a torn rotator cuff for about 7 years... had surgery on the shoulder in '14 to fix another problem, and they discovered the tear during the surgery.

Insurance had not preapproved to fix the rotator cuff, only the other issue, so they didn't fix it while they were in there.

It bothers me pretty consistently, but not enough to where I'm willing to take time enough for the surgery and recovery.

I can't sleep on that side at all... when I do, I'm in a lot of pain for a few days.

Fix it if you can afford to take the time off... I'll eventually get around to fixing mine, but I'm planning a hip replacement for later this year - shoulder's gonna have to wait.

Good luck.

[hoosier]

I believe the prognosis for non-surgical approaches depends a lot on where the tear is located, how severe it is, and what your symptoms are. What state is your bad shoulder in right now? Did your docs give you more info on what kind of tear you're dealing with? Surgical approaches aren't a magic bullet either: they require lots of time off and rehab and the failure rate is higher than you would like if you're going to go through all of that. So, if I were in your shoes, I would probably start out with the less invasive approach if you don't have the kind of severe tear that absolutely requires surgery. Based on the fact that you're even asking the question, I am assuming you have the garden variety, not the acute kind. Did it happen all of a sudden or has it been a gradual thing? If you hold your arms out horizontally so they're parallel to the ground, do you have enough strength to push up on the bad side against moderate resistance?

[Zool]

I believe the prognosis for non-surgical approaches depends a lot on where the tear is located, how severe it is, and what your symptoms are. What state is your bad shoulder in right now? Did your docs give you more info on what kind of tear you're dealing with? Surgical approaches aren't a magic bullet either: they require lots of time off and rehab and the failure rate is higher than you would like if you're going to go through all of that. So, if I were in your shoes, I would probably start out with the less invasive approach if you don't have the kind of severe tear that absolutely requires surgery. Based on the fact that you're even asking the question, I am assuming you have the garden variety, not the acute kind. Did it happen all of a sudden or has it been a gradual thing? If you hold your arms out horizontally so they're parallel to the ground, do you have enough strength to push up on the bad side against moderate resistance?

Correct, non acute. Held up against resistance. I've been (not nearly often enough) doing rehab for about a year. Yesterday I extended my arm quickly and got a searing pain for about 2 hours. Felt like the first one all over again. I assume I just need to do the rehab religiously for it to get better?

[wist43]

I've just never had any long term improvement with therapy... my goal is always to be rid of it for good.

Had enough injuries and surgeries that I don't even mess around anymore - fuck therapy, I go straight to surgery if I can. Therapy is too much work for the meager return, and as you experienced, one tweak and you're right back where you started.

[MadtownPacker]

Shit is fucked up. Took over 2 years to go away. Same stuff like you guys and yeah shit makes it hard to sleep. I haven’t tweaked it for years but now ok unless this thread is jinxed. Get it fixed if you can, it gets aggravated easy and you are back where you started. any stupid lift is all it takes. Thoughts of amputation seemed like a relief.

[scharpcheddar]

It's not up to doctors. It's up to you

[hoosier]

Correct, non acute. Held up against resistance. I've been (not nearly often enough) doing rehab for about a year. Yesterday I extended my arm quickly and got a searing pain for about 2 hours. Felt like the first one all over again. I assume I just need to do the rehab religiously for it to get better?

I have a mild tear in shoulder labrum for years, and it acts very similarly to what Mad described. You can and should rehab it, but every now and then you are going to do something that aggravates it and then you will have days or even weeks of suffering. It's not something you can avoid unless you just stay away from that arm altogether--and then it will get weaker and more liable to get injured. You gotta train your brain to load SLOWLY with that arm: when you go to pull a gallon of milk off the top shelf of the fridge, do it slowly or you might tweak it. I put myself in harm's way continuously by coaching my kids's LL baseball teams. Every spring my shoulder starts hurting like the motherfucker. I do warm ups and ice it religiously, I pop high strength NSAIDs, and I still have a week where I cannot sleep through the night because the inflammation has nowhere to go when you're lying down. I guess it comes down to whether your lifestyle enables you to baby it or not, and your tolerance for pain. I don't baby mine, I have a high pain tolerance, and only once has the pain gotten so bad I wanted to put a bullet through my head. So no surgery for me. :)

[Upnorth]

Don't over baby it. Keep up the range of motion or scar tissue builds and it keeps getting worse.
Kt tape or athletic tape does wonders for both torn rotator cuff and plantar facitis.

Taping
https://youtu.be/ssH35JwmwTM

If you can exercise
https://youtu.be/ssH35JwmwTM

If it's not too bad I strongly recommend taping.

I know the plantar facitis isn't what you are askng about but I currently have been taping for about 3 weeks due to a reinjury.

[Zool]

This is a ton of really good info. Thank you all. Been working on range of motion for the last couple weeks. Pain is mostly gone until I move in just the right direction. I'm going to look into taping as I have a ton of construction projects for this summer.

[Spaulding]

Sorry to hear. Rotator tears suck. Torn my a about five years ago while climbing pegs with the spider monkey kids I coached. Alas the shoulder gave out and took probably 3-4 months of rehab to be back to any semblance of normal usage.

Depending on the location and grade of tear, all the research I've done suggests going the PT route. My doctor at Mayo even said with the strength building that your LAT muscles can help accommodate the strength of the area.

However, I tore that shoulder again last Summer and it's sucked even worse every since. All the PT in the world hasn't seemed to help and still can't sleep on that side (as Wist noted for his) nor really lift much above my shoulder with that arm.

Given surgery holds no promises, between that and the cost and there never being a good time to do the proper recovery work it's a hard call to make.

I hope that PT helps you get to a point where you can do the things needed/wanted without much pain. Otherwise I find that several BA beers always helps :)

If you go forward with surgery - good luck!

[George Cumby]

Anyone have any experience? All of my college eligibility is gone, and my pro career never manifested so the doctors aren't super interested in cutting me open to repair a middle aged desk jockey's shoulder.

Has anyone just used PT and how did it turn out?

I've had both of my shoulders surgically repaired. I've got a shit-ton of experience with that and pt/pre-hab, etc. Some of it may even be correct.

DM me and we can talk.

[Spaulding]

I've had both of my shoulders surgically repaired. I've got a shit-ton of experience with that and pt/pre-hab, etc. Some of it may even be correct.

DM me and we can talk.

Would you recommend surgery?

[smuggler]

Hey Zool. Totally missed this thread and I'm wondering how you're doing.

I'm not a doctor, but I work in medical. I read a study that long-term prognosis for middle-aged people with SLAP injuries is not great, but if it's a tendon or muscle injury to one of the SITS muscles, it would mostly depend on the severity of the injury. If you are experiencing extreme limitations, you probably will not see great results with physical therapy, but everyone is different.

Do you know if it's a complete tear or an avulsion away from the bone? You are best served by getting diagnostic imaging to determine the actually best course of action. Failing that, having a couple sessions of PT in direct observation of a professional will help identify the areas where you need work.

I don't know your insurance situation, but typically an MRI requires an x-ray and a trip to the ortho doc or the physical therapist requires a trip to your PCM for a referral. It all gets very costly very quickly.

If you need help wading through the referral mess, you can PM me and I can potentially help with that.

If you're keeping things within your own lane, keep in mind there's therapy to help heal the injury and then therapy to help correct any imbalance that might have brought it on. Your shoulders (and I know this applies to me and many others as well) are probably well forward of where they should be. Strengthening your rhomboids can help keep your shoulder blades back and keep you in a more neutral position and (perhaps) keep you from exacerbating the injury again. Again, I have to stress I'm not a doctor, but just something to chew on.

Here's a pretty decent resource for exercise that you might consider: http://news.meyerpt.com/physical-therapists/phase-2-shoulder-rehab/