Shoulder Pain

[Question_it_all]

I have a shoulder injury that I got when I was 17, I'm 23 now, and it is an evil beast. When I lift hard it feels like someone is tearing my muscle form the damn bone. Do those TENS machines work? Feel free to throw any type of advice, as I know shoulder injuries are not uncommon in this type of sport. I welcome all input. Thanks a lot.

Question_it_all

 

[xcelbeyond]

I have 2 bad shoulders. ART is what keeps me going!

xcel

 

[Brent D.]

Shoulder pain...

Question_it_all,

It really depends on the source of the pain.

Pain in the shoulder can be caused by multiple reasons.

Glenohumeral instability due to a biomechanical issue such as either a ligament injury or a total separation of a rotator cuff muscle is a possible cause. Damage to the gliding surface of the actual glenohumeral joint can also cause pain and instability. Or adhesions (scar tissue) from a previous injury that prevents the normal movement pattern around the effected joint. Shoulder impingement is another possible source of pain.

It just depends on the specific injury.

To answer your question on a TENS unit, in my experience a TENS unit can help reduce the sensation of pain in some injuries, but if the problem is deep it becomes far less effective. The TENS unit can prevent some atrophy in a muscle that is completely immobilized but it really doesn't work well for hypertrophy. Other then that, the TENS unit is just a novelty.

Could you post the specifics of your shoulder injury? What were you doing when you hurt it? (mechanism of injury) Are their any visible deformations to the effected shoulder? Specifically, what type of movements bothers it and describe anything else that isolates the problem.

Hang in there; I recovered from a rotator cuff injury 100%.

Finding the problem is the only way to find the solution.

Brent D.

 

[Dave_19]

im going through the same shit right now only have been able to work legs and biceeps, im taking a break from training tho and going on vacation tonight for awhile hopefully im feeling better by the time i get home.

 

[mike man]

Don't forget

Bicep tendonitis could give you the illusion of a shoulder injury. The bicep tendon ties in way up under the front delt.

 

[Brent D.]

Illusion?

mike man,

It’s usually not an illusion.

Bicipital tendonitis can occur in the long head of the biceps tendon due to instability in the glenohumeral joint. This is due to the fact that the long head of the biceps tendon can act as a stabilizer (secondary to the supraspinatus) for the shoulder joint.

Take a look at this web site and notice the biomechanics involved.

**broken link removed**

The next web site has some pretty clear MRI’s. The first picture on the right side is a good MRI view of the biceps tendon at its origin. The large white round object in the middle is the head of the humerus the biceps tendon is the very dark band on the upper right side of the head of the humerus.

The MRI is looking down on the left shoulder and the person is facing the top of the page.

**broken link removed**

As you can see, the long head of the biceps tendon originates from the superior aspect of the glenoid fossa (top of the shoulder joint) and passes and laterally over the superior aspect of the head of the humerus. It then runs through the joint capsule and distally between the greater and lesser tuberosity and through the bicipital groove.

Sound a little like Gray’s Anatomy?

Occasionally, due to acute or traumatic injury, the transverse ligament that holds the long head of the biceps tendon in the bicipital groove becomes ineffective and the tendon does not track in the groove correctly. This can also lead to biceps tendonitis.

To sum it up, most often bicipital tendonitis is symptom of a greater problem.

Brent D.

 

[mike man]

Brent

Thanks for going more in depth on what I was talking about.
I guess I was saying illusion because when I had this problem of "shoulder pain" for quite some time, it really ended up being bicep tendonitis.
I realized that I had been cheating so bad on my BB curls that it caused the problem for me.
Once I corrected this by abstaining from the BB curls for a few months, it slowly went away.
I thought it was a shoulder injury because one of the days it would hurt the most was shoulder day.
I still have a shoulder problem in the other shoulder now due to impingement, but thourough stretching helps alleviate it quite a bit.