Shoulder & Rotator Cuff Care in Mesa, AZ

The human shoulder is capable of a wide degree of movement. Unfortunately, this comes with a price: the shoulder is very prone to injury. Couple this with poor posture, long periods sitting in front of a computer and sedentary lifestyles, and you begin to understand why shoulder problems are so common.

We have traditionally viewed most shoulder problems as a version of tendonitis, but as our understanding has grown we've realized that isn't really the case. “Tendonosis” is the condition behind most shoulder problems — and it is NOT an inflammatory condition, so anti-inflammatories and most prescriptions will have little effect.

Tendonosis means scar tissue within the soft tissue of the tendons. Any injury creates inflammation, and as the body heals it doesn't heal 100%: some scar tissue remains. That scar tissue is more prone to re-injury, which recycles the process and deposits more and more scar tissue over time. Given enough time, tearing of the rotator cuff muscles becomes much more likely, and even quite common.

Not even close to true in most cases. A large percentage of women over 50 have rotator cuff tears they aren't even aware of! So a tear may well have been present before an injury, and the injury simply worsened what was already there. Just because an MRI shows a tear doesn't mean it wasn't present a year ago when you had no pain. Does that sound like surgery is the only option?

If tendonosis with scar tissue is present, no amount of stretching, strengthening, ultrasound, massage or interferential will change that. Unless the scar tissue is addressed, the shoulder isn't really fixed. Tendonosis requires a different soft-tissue approach.