Still having Shoulder pain need help.

Have you tried another specialist?

Hi Dan,

So sorry to hear your story. I'm curious on your medication Oxycotin. I'm on that medication but suffer horrendous withdrawal symptoms if I don't take it on time. Coming off scares me because of this. Advice would be gratefully received.

Also, I was told by a physio that my shoulder pain was because 'I was stressed'. I needed to relax more!! The little fact that there was no cartilage and my pain was bone on bone movement obviously didn't count!!

Dan thankyou for writing your story...I have a 60 year old brother with cerebral palsy and an intellectual disability...he has been having shoulder / neck pain for almost 9 months now. He has spent 3 weeks in hospital and 3 in rehab this year the sent home with no answers. Other than what is showing up on the scans, xrays is not indicative of the pain he has..in other words...it is in your head! Low pain threshold etc!!!! He too has been on strong pain killers...Lyrica..stopped because of side effects, Oxycontin, endone, targine, osteo panadol..has been on endep for 2 weeks and have added tramel in the last few days! He says that the pain never completely goes away..it is sometimes bearable if he does not use his arm...trouble is it is the 'good' arm as he has CP on the left side. Dressing, tying shoes, any movement of his arm causes pain. While in hospital it was being treated as a shoulder problem as there is a small tear...in desperation I took him to the orthopedic specialist as I had done earlier...he believes now that it is his neck not his shoulder..he has pain down the side of his face into his neck, shoulder, arm, hand and fingers. Sometimes in his right leg as well...he describes it as being 'dead' or very heavy. We have tried acupuncture with no success. He screams in pain with physio and eventually would not let them touch it. The same with a chiro. He says that the pain is worse at night and also has trouble sleeping. I really do not know what to do next. I took him to another GP over the weekend to see if he could get even some temporary pain relief and I was hoping for a 2nd opinion too...of course without access to all his test results he could not really help...di suggest looking into the possibility of it being a dsiruption to circulation...nerve damage. We have been to a neurologist but really at the end of the day he was not treated well...public patient! Come back in 12 months! No neck specialist in the town we live in. He has not been to his supported employment all of this year and I cannot see light at the end of the tunnel..I do n ot think that he will be able to return to work at all if this is  ot resolved. I will continue to follow here and see if anyone has any suggestions. Hope that it can all improve for you too. Hang in there.

 

http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=A00678

have your nerves (specifically your long thoracic nerve) and brachial plexus checked. I provided a link to info for the brachial plexus above.

The long thoracic nerve is extremely thin and fragile. When your surgeon went it to operate he could have injured it. I was told it can get injured by how they position your head during surgery as well as in the recovery room. 

Do do you have any other symptoms such as scapular winging?  Migraines?

have you tried dry needling and trigger point injections? 

I have horrific pain in my right shoulder for the past 4 years and have had 3 shoulder surgeries, none successful.

I feel your pain truly. I can only write and type for 10-15 min at a time before I break into spasms. I have been on all of the meds you mentioned, except the hardcore ones. I am on Tramadol as needed. 

It it really makes it hard to be productive in anyway.  make sure you don't fall into post surgical depression. 

I have been to many top doctors in Chicago, no one knows what's wrong.  I am finally being told to see a neurologist. 

I I hope this helps you a little. If not at least we got to share our horrid shoulder experiences. 

Hi Dan, I sympthathise with you. I too am tired of being told numerous things like change your diet, become more active to it's all in your head, you are a melingerer.

I fell up some stairs at work over 6 years ago and as a consequence had bilateral subacromial bursitis which resulted in me having to have 1 operation on my left shoulder and 3 on my right.  The op on the left shoulder worked a treat up until recently.  As for my right shoulder I have been trying to get back to working 7.5hrs a day since the injury and subsequent operations but have had numerous flare ups which had me reducing my work hours for a considerable period of time.

My work place is not very supportive and see me as a melingerer (I would love for them to have to deal with the pain and not being able to do what I want).  I rarely have a day that I am not in some sort of pain and like you hate taking pain killers, I try to control the pain using heat packs - some days it works better than others. My specialist told me from the very beginning that the operations may or may not work - if they didn't I would just have to learn to live with the pain and not being able to do all that I used to.  Which to me seems a cop out. 

Unfortunately, we fall into the too hard basket and because the cause of our pain is not visable there is very little assistance or understanding out there.  Everyone's body is different in relation to the way their tendons and muscles work unfortunately the medical fraternity seem to forget that one important thing when diagnosing and setting up so called rehabilitation programs. 

I am thinking about finding somewhere that does "Trigger Therapy" to see if that will help. 

Trigger therapy? Are you referring to the treatment of trigger points? If so, any good chiroprachter or osteopath should be able to help.

Best wishes, NICK