Frozen shoulder and neck pain

Hi Jill, neck pain with frozen shoulder is quite common. Research has shown that patients with frozen shoulder have more active upper traps (that's yer main neck muscle), it tightens up in response to the frozen shoulder.

You can help by massaging/kneading the muscles at the junction between your neck and shoulder and by stretching your neck - so, if your frozen shoulder is on the right, try tilting your left ear down to your left shoulder, then use your left hand, grasped over the top of your head, to apply a little more downward pressure - hold for 30secs and relax, repeat 5-6 times - you can do it whilst watching TV.

A little more advanced, you could google 'trigger points upper traps' you'll have a tight little bundle (it'll feel like a pea under your skin) which you can apply pressure to to help relieve the pain - it's kinda like self-acupuncture.

Hope that helps!!

Thank you so much for your advice - that is really helpful. I do hope the neck pain disappears when (hopefully) eventually the frozen shoulder goes!

Hi thank you also for this information , I'm having neck problems after the surgery for frozen shoulder , Ive been suffering pain now for two years , I was thankful to find this information as I was beginning to think something else was starting to happen , I was told that I had slight athritus

Hi Jillgrace,

I have similar problems that started with a bit of arthritis in my neck many years ago. Then the nerve root became impinged a bit and that's what can give you a frozen shoulder.

The 50's are a very common time for this to worsen. Due to lifetime of work and use.

If you can pinpoint an area where the pain seems to be at it's worse and it's about 3"(approximately) from the middle of the base of your neck on the shoulder line, slightly to the back rather than the front, you probably have arthritis in C4/5 or 6.

You can be reffered to the hospital for an injection/epidural for this. It sounds as if you at least need an up to date x ray or scan. This will pinpoint the problem for you.

The bad news it is unlikely to go away completely. It will flare up and down depending on what you are doing.

Working on the computer is one of the worst things, all slightly bent neck actions can make it worse.

If you feel any pain/tingling in your arm please go and get it checked out, this is definitely nerve impingment.

Hi

I haven't been involved in this discussion but thought I would post this tip here from another discussion:

And here's a tip that might help. Try taking an afternoon nap on a sofa. Make it comfortable for your neck when you rest it on the arm of the sofa by using some soft pillows. Lie sideways with the offending shoulder on the sofa (not on the pillow because that raises it), and tuck your arm tightly into ribs. Cover well to keep yourself warm, and see how you feel when you wake half an hour or hour later. Might need a couple of days to get an effect because thats how long it can take the neck to adjust. Used to work for me, to the point where sometimes I would get up in the night and do it. Less bed and more sofa definitely kept the pain from becoming intolerable. Also, if you can take a nap in an upright position, in an armchair for instance, with your head rested upright against some pillows, it can work as well. These positional adjustments can help to break the cyclical nature of the symptoms, whereas doing the same routines like always sleeping in the same bed in the same positions just encourages the cyclical spasm. At first it will seem irritating or awkward to have to change your usual cosy routines, but it really can help to improve things, and if the result turns out to be less pain....its a winner.

Gerry

With my first FS on my non-dominant side, the pain was in the shoulder (constant aching) and the spasms would run the length of the outside of my arm all the way to the wrist. I'm now at the tail end of the thawing stage with that side, having recovered 95% of my range of motions. With this one, (dominant side) I'm in the freezing stage, and I don't have the constant aching pain, only the spasms, when I move my arm past the current range of motion. With this FS, instead of the spasm running down the arm, it goes up, across my trapezius muscle into my neck, and slightly down the inside of the arm from the armpit to towards the elbow. When the spasm hits the neck, it feels like something is stabbing me in the neck.

I'm trying myofascial release and seems to be helping with muscle spasms in my neck and shoulder blade.