Shoulder Pain Treatment

Shoulder pain is characterised by swollen tendons. There are several factors that can contribute to shoulder pain. The most prevalent cause is rotator cuff tendinitis.

Sometimes shoulder pain is caused due to injury to another location in your body, like the neck or biceps. This is known as referred pain. Referred pain generally doesn’t get worse when you move your shoulder.

Causes:

• arthritis
• torn cartilage
• torn rotator cuff
• swollen tendons
• bone spurs (bony projections that develop along the edges of bones)
• nerve pinching
• broken shoulder or arm bone
• frozen shoulder
• dislocated shoulder
• injury due to overuse or repetitive use
• spinal cord injury
• heart attack

What is a Frozen Shoulder?

Frozen shoulder causes stiffness and pain in your shoulder joint. Its signs and symptoms typically begin gradually, worsen over time and then resolve, usually within one to three years. People with restricted mobility of the arm due to medical condition or procedure such as a stroke or a mastectomy are at higher risk of developing frozen shoulder.

Symptoms of Frozen Shoulder:

• Frozen shoulder develops in three stages. Each stage can last for a couple of months.
• Freezing stage: In this stage, any movement of your shoulder causes pain that limits the motion of the shoulder.
• Frozen stage:Pain starts to reduce but your shoulder becomes stiffer, and using it becomes more difficult.
• Thawing stage:Movement of the shoulder starts to improve.

Risk Factors of Frozen Shoulder:

Certain factors may increase your risk of developing a frozen shoulder.

Age and gender:

People 40 and older are likely to have a risk of frozen shoulder, particularly women.

Immobility or reduced mobility:

People who have Immobility of their arm for a long time due to certain conditions like:

• Rotator cuff injury
• Broken arm
• Stroke
• Recovery from surgery
• Systemic diseases

Diseases that might increase the risk of frozen shoulder include:

• Diabetes
• Overactive thyroid (hyperthyroidism)
• Underactive thyroid (hypothyroidism)
• Cardiovascular disease
• Tuberculosis
• Parkinson’s disease
• Treatments Available for Shoulder Pain and Frozen shoulder:
• Following treatment methods are used to reduce shoulder pain:

Physiotherapy:

Physiotherapy treatment works better for most of the shoulder problems. These techniques helps to improve your symptoms and help get your shoulder moving properly again.

Physiotherapy for shoulder pain varies based on whether the pain is short-term or long-term.

Physiotherapy includes:

• Exercises to strengthen weakened muscles, change their co-ordination and improve function
• Advice on improving shoulder, neck and spine posture
• Exercises to ease or prevent stiffness
• Exercise to increase the range of joint movement

Applying adhesive tape to the skin to reduce the strain on the tissues, and to help increase your awareness of the position of the shoulder and shoulder blade

Manual treatments to the soft tissues and joints – such as massage and manipulation.

Occupational therapy

If shoulder pain is creating problem in daily activities, such as dressing, washing and driving, occupational therapy is recommended to reduce strain on your shoulder. The therapy helps you to regain your independence by showing you how to change your movements to help prevent pain continuing or returning.

Steroid injections

Steroid injections in joint can give quick relief from shoulder pain. It is given with local anaesthesia. The steroid injections can help to reduce inflammation and allows you to move your shoulder more comfortably.

It also helps to make your physiotherapy exercises easier, but you shouldn’t use your shoulder for anything too strenuous for the first two days after an injection.

Joint distension:

It is useful for the treatment of frozen shoulder. Sterile water is injected into the joint capsule can help stretch the tissue and make it easier to move the joint.

Shoulder manipulation:

It is useful for the treatment of frozen shoulder. In this procedure, a general anaesthetic is given to you to make you unconscious. Then your pain doctor moves your shoulder joint in different directions, to help loosen the tightened tissue.

Surgery

Surgery is usually the last option. Most shoulder problems improve without surgery. But if any of the above techniques does not work, then surgery can be performed using keyhole techniques, which require a smaller incision and tend to reduce your recovery time.