This is all too common in our healthcare system. Patients try everything and nothing works. This story is about Sarah, one of our past patients who has pain in her shoulder. It hurts to move her shoulder. She has difficulty raising her arm up above her head and to the side. (You do may or may not have full motion in your shoulder.) The pain is in the shoulder or down her arm a little bit.
She tried a Chiropractor who does ART/massage to the shoulder and that did not give her any relief…
She tried Physical Therapy and she was given strengthening exercises for her shoulder, and the exercises were making her worse (or for some it just does not work).
She kept telling everyone that she was seeing that what they are doing is not working, but they keep doing the same things. They do not change things up. They do not seem to be listening to her which is frustrating in itself…
Now it gets worse, they told her there is nothing they can do, and you need to have surgery or injections.
Sarah had lost all hope and now thinks the only thing now that can help her is to have SURGERY or get INJECTIONS for her shoulder pain…
So, Sarah tried injections, and they did not work? Why?
It is because she did not have a chemical problem- meaning the pain is not due to swelling which creates the chemicals coming to your shoulder with an injury. If that were the case, then Chemicals such as injections and medications will work.
But when it is due to movements and movement habits that are creating the problems, she needed a body mechanic (like our office) to understand where the source of the problems is coming from.
Ultimately you have to get to the source of the problem and injections did not do that!
She was getting more frustrated that maybe she cannot get help and that she will have to live with this for the rest of her life!
That she won’t be able to do yoga or play tennis again. That she cannot pick up her kids. Even cooking was getting to be a problem. Her mind started going down the worst case scenario path and she was spiraling down and felt so out of control.
What do you do? Will surgery really help because everything that is being suggested to her was not working…
Do you feel this way? Does this sound like you? Or maybe a friend you know is going through this?
It is crazy because we hear stories like Sarah’s, all the time.
Luckily Sarah got referred to our physical therapy clinic by a friend of hers and is so pleased that she found us.
There are so many sources of pain that can refer into the shoulder. Remember how I always say where the source of the problem is not often the site of the pain.
EVERYONE looked at the shoulder. Even the doctors!!
They treated the site of the pain.
No one looked at the neck or thoracic spine to find that maybe just maybe the pain was coming from the neck or thoracic spine or combo.
The body is connected. It is why I get frustrated with our healthcare system when you hear. I am only a shoulder doctor, you need to see another specialist for the neck and vise versa.
You only look at the tissue as the problem. You only go to the site of the pain. You do not find people to put it all together for you.
So with this patient who everyone only went to her shoulder, we found out it was a combo of lower cervical and a upper thoracic problem.
When we started treating that area and not even touch her shoulder initially, she got better. We gave her self-mobilizations to help her maintain the reduced mobility in her neck between appointments and progressed her with each visit.
It did take time; I will not lie about that. But within 1 month, she was in control of her pain. The next month we could start getting her back to strengthening (because we got her mobility back in her spine) and by the 3rd month she was back to doing all her activities, even picking up her kids! And we did this with 1x a week appointment!
We saved her from having a dangerous surgery that would not have worked! And now SHE knows what to do to maintain her feeling great and understanding what she did that was creating the problem.
Who do you know that is having a problem like this? We have several options for them to continue their learning..
First they can download our FREE REPORT on how to resolve Neck and Shoulder pain! CLICK here to get that report. It is my top tips on how to resolve neck and shoulder pain!
OR
They can come to our office to talk with one of our specialists for FREE! This way we can help them make a better decision about their health. They can get to know us and we can make sure we can help them. If you or your friend would like to sign up for this, CLICK HERE to start that process!
