Anyone dealt with rotator cuff tendonitis? (Bonus points if you're also a runner)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

So, I’ve been having this shoulder problem since March. It came on fairly suddenly and not due to any particular incident. It’s radiating pain that seems to be focused in my upper left shoulder area. I can also often feel it in my upper chest area, and my neck. Hurts to lift my arm above shoulder level (although I can do it if absolutely necessary) and sometimes just hurts if I’m sitting here doing nothing. Does not hurt to reach behind and across my back. The day before it happened, I lifted 30-40 pounds of groceries with just my left arm, and in the weeks before it happened I’d been doing an aerobics video that involved a lot of punching/striking motions. I also was hauling Whatsit the Youngest around a lot, on my left hip and supported by my left arm.

Anyway, after a couple months or so of this pain, I realized it wasn’t healing on its own, and made an appointment with my GP, who happens to be an osteopath. She recommended “osteopathic manipulation.” This did jack squat. I got a second opinion. The second doctor sent me to an orthopedic specialist. When I saw him, it had been about four months since the pain started. He did an X-ray, saw nothing significant there, and recommended a cortisone shot.

The cortisone shot helped for like two weeks and then it got worse again. I went back to the orthopedic guy. He said, well, we could do an MRI at this point or I could do another cortisone shot plus a full month of NSAIDs around the clock. I said, dude, you’re the doctor, you tell me. He said, well, you’re only 32 so it seems unlikely that you’d have damage in there, so let’s do the shot + NSAIDs. I said OK.

That was last Thursday. The cortisone shot does not appear to have made a significant improvement this time. Ditto the NSAIDs, which I am taking religiously nonetheless. I also asked the guy on this most recent visit whether running could be having any effect on this. He said, yeah, sure it could, but told me that “if you really MUST run” then there’s nothing I can do to make the impact better. He also wrote me a prescription for physical therapy for “rotator cuff tendonitis” – I see the PT people tomorrow.

I’m kind of freaking out about the idea that running could be aggravating this thing. I am really tired of shoulder pain and would really like to get full use of my shoulder back. But I really, really don’t want to quit running, and nobody else seems to think that running should be impacting shoulder tendonitis. I guess I’m just wondering if anyone else has experienced this problem or has any advice. I’m wondering if I should get a second opinion or just go get the MRI already or what. Maybe I should wait until after I see the physical therapists and see what they say.

I just don’t know. I have never had any chronic physical problem like this before and I just want it to be fixed, like, yesterday.

2

I’ve never dealt with this but from reading this article, I wouldn’t think running would make it worse.

3

You have Burcitis, I have it, It is never going away.
I skimmed your post, not sure if I saw any sleeping difficulties, (yet), it is hard to sleep when laying in a ‘fencer’s position’ on say yor right side causes excruciating pain after 5 minutes.

4

I just looked up bursitis online and most sites seem to say that there are treatment options. I am willing to get surgery if that’s what it comes to. (I hope not.) I refuse to believe that I am going to have to put up with this for the rest of my life. :eek:

5

It doesn’t sound like rotator cuff as I understand it, because you can reach back. One of the classic things health care people ask to diagnose it is if you can put your hand in your back pocket.

My recommendation is to see a physical therapist, with or without an MRI.

A doctor will want to do an MRI, but a good PT can diagnose the problem and make recommendations without it.

A medical doctor will likely give you pills, or another cortisone shot, or both.

An orthopedic surgeon will probably have some kind of surgery to recommend.

A PT won’t do any of that unless s/he thinks it won’t respond otherwise. It’s not an instant fix but–for me, anyway–it beat surgery. Of course it depends on what you have.

When I had the rotator cuff thing, I pretty much stopped using the arm. According to the PT I eventually saw this only made things worse. I guess generally keeping moving is good, so unless running hurts, why stop?

6

OK, that is encouraging, considering I have a PT appointment for tomorrow. I hope they’re good. I am willing to do stretching, strengthening exercises, whatever it takes. I was kind of surprised after my first orthopedic appointment, not to be sent home with a list of stretches etc. I just 1) want to fix it somehow, and 2) want to not have to quit running.

7

me: 42 y/o male weightlifter and runner (up to 10-12k sometimes).

Shoulder trouble started in March, 2009.

MRI = tendinitis (and arthritis as possible). This is inflammation and causes ‘impingement’, which is reduced range and pain because the area is squeezed and inflamed.

I have found running to hurt sometimes, but I don’t think it’s actually damaging it. For me, it is the weight training.

I have taken anti-inflammatories and taken time off (up to ten days, twice), but it is now September and I can’t seem to beat it. I am managing around it.

Tendinitis is an innocent sounding word, but it’d damn painful, and on-going inflammation can cause perm damage and lead to arthritis.

I just keep my shoulder still when running, and an orthopedist said controlled shoulder swinging can help keep the joint lubed.

I am stumped.

8

My father was diagnosed with rotator cuff tendonitis. He had a couple of cortisone injections, as far as I know he hasn’t had any more trouble with it. That would be maybe five years ago, so before he ran the two marathons! He’s 67, and runs five days a week.

9

I had elbow tendonitis, and they told me that generally, full recovery takes the same amount of time as you have been feeling the pain. So, under that rule you’d be looking at 4 months. I resisted steroids, but ended up having some in one arm after ultrasouund, massage, ice, NSAIDS, change of sleeping position, night brace, and strengthening didn’t improve it past a certain point.

I am surprised no one started you on an ice regime. I’m not an expert but I’ve never had a doctor or PT not recommend ice for a strain injury. I thought that was the go-to.

BTW, my PT recommended a return to my elbow-related sport (ultimate frisbee) and said that the benefit from improved circulation outweighed the additional irritation from from throwing a frisbee. So don’t worry about what the PT says until they say it.

10

Have they ruled out frozen shoulder (adhesive capsulitis)? I got this a couple of years ago. It just came on out of the blue (and in the shoulder that I hadn’t hurt years earlier) for me, and after an agonizing night spent in emergency and an x-ray later, strong anti-inflammatories and physical therapy had me straightened out until our recent move (where I used the shoulder too much and flared it up again).

11

Back from PT. I definitely don’t have frozen shoulder; she checked for that. I have begun a regime of stretching and strengthening exercises, and am to ice the area after exercise and also in the evenings when it usually gets worse. After 4 weeks we will re-evaluate. And, excellent news, I absolutely do not have to stop runnng. :smiley: Although the PT did suggest making sure that my arm swing is not excessive, either back-to-front or side-to-side.

I feel much better about things today but kind of wish that my GP had sent me to physical therapy several months ago when I first reported this problem.

12

Glad you don’t have frozen shoulder, because apparently that’s really bad. (I almost did, on account of not using it for fear I’d do more damage.)

I had shoulder issues twice–once for each shoulder–and the first time I went to the doc first, and it took forever to get a referral to the PT. Then it turned out the PT they referred me to did not take my insurance, so I ended up finding one on my own. I wish I had just gone there first. So the second time that’s what I did–I bypassed the MD entirely.

Also, the first time the MD suggested I stop swimming and dancing. The PT not only said I could swim, but gave me stretches to do before and after. (Ah, but she also suggested unloading the dishwasher as therapy.)

Hope you get better soon.

13

you could have your c-5 and c-6 vertebra’s with nerve damage get a MRI on you spine to see. I have degenerative disc disease which stared in my earlier 30 had to have a fusion but know i get cortisone shots in this area which help with this also look for a chiropractor that has k-laser therapy in your area they just rub this laser on your affected area and will get instant relief in most cases

14

I damaged my shoulder trying to stop a horse (it is a bit like grabbing a bus going by at 15mph). Mine was not formally diagnosed, but from online research it looked like the original injury went into tendonitis. Talk to your PT, but in my experience you really need to rest a tendon until the inflamation is gone because you can get permanent damage from it.

Two things that you could consider:

Arnica flower heads as a poultice. I put a cup of them into a sauce pan w/water, put a coffee filter into a bowl, dump the boiled flower heads into the bowl and form a poultice out of the coffee filter. Then I can re-heat the water with the microwave if I want to re-heat it. I would use this when either you suspect you’ve re-injured it or when it isn’t in that throbby inflamed mode. (you can buy by the pound ($8.40) from www.herbalcom.com - go to products and ordering link to see the lists of herb available) - this promotes longer term healing in the tissue. This is also REALLY good for large hemotomas or any injury like that. – also, don’t leave the Arnica in the kitchen or the water in the pan. You should not ingest Arnica and you don’t want someone to mistake it for tea or for camomile.

DMSO against the inflamation. Google this. It IS stinky, but if you want relief from the pain enough, it is worth it. BUT, make sure you use it on clean skin and with a clean applicator because it can carry a lot of things into your tissues. This will take down the inflamation and give immediate relief. - This also increases blood flow that your tendon needs for faster healing.

BUT, the biggest issue is that anytime you relieve the pain, you also risk re-injuring it because you no longer protect it.

My shoulder hurt for several months before I figured out what was wrong with it. I could not lift it straight out to the side w/out pain (and could not lift any weight that way at all). It hurt when I worked at the desk or when I laid on it. It took me about three months of focusing on letting it rest and using either arnica or DMSO when I’d angered it (say, I had to move hay, etc). But by the next spring it was ‘normal’ again and didn’t need special treatment any more.

15

So there’s a lot that could be going on here. All I can say is, I didn’t have the best insurance when my injury happened so I never got the MRI or anything to get a definitive diagnosis.

It was probably bursitis, but could have been tendonitis just as easily… except it seemed to kind of ‘creak’ when it got bad so I thought the former. I went on Triflex and scaled back my workouts a lot and in about 6-9 months it healed. But it hasn’t been 100% ever since. At least I no longer wake up sleeping on it in severe pain.

Bottom line, rest rest rest. And yes, Im sure your running is worsening it as it rotates your ‘cuff’ or at least is impairing healing. As is the cortisone shot… just ask any ex-football player.

Best of luck.

16

I started this thread in 2009. After a couple of rounds of physical therapy, two cortisone shots, and a lot of just hoping things would get better on their own, I finally got an MRI. And was told, “There’s some bursitis but nothing that should be causing you this much pain.” So I went back to physical therapy. And then spent some time just hoping it would get better on its own. Then I went in for a second MRI, which showed deterioration and “mild bone spurring.”

So I had surgery. They shaved off the bone spur and “cleaned up the joint,” in my orthopedic surgeon’s words. Then back to PT again. It’s been a year since that surgery, and my shoulder is back to about 90-95% functioning, which I’m quite pleased with. It rarely hurts these days. I would say the surgery was a massive success.

(I had a lot of people along the way suggest various forms of woo to me, including herbal poultices, acupuncture, Chinese pills, and the like. I ignored them all and am glad I did.)