My mother had a recent arm injury–my father (80) was falling and she (67) reached out to catch him. She heard/felt something bad happen in her upper arm. She was in severe pain for a couple of days, but a month later, felt back to normal, had no muscle weakness, loss of ROM, etc. But, since both she and my father are retired medical professionals, she went to the doctor. (Due to various snowstorms, etc., a month was the earliest point that she could get out to an orthopod.)
The doctor examined her, found nothing wrong, thought maybe she had torn her biceps a little–nothing to worry about. To be safe, though, they scheduled an MRI. After the MRI came back, the doc said, “Oh–you have a full-thickness rotator cuff tear. Can we do surgery next week?”
Well, there’s no way that my parents can schedule any surgery that quickly–in addition to my father’s care and mobility issues, my mother’s on her own little raft of drugs, some of which she needs to step off of prior to any surgery. So she went for a second opinion. Second doctor also says she needs surgery, but he won’t perform it until she gets sign-off from all of her other doctors. Furthermore, he’s (a) not sure that the rotator cuff tear is even from this most recent incident–it could just be from years of degeneration–and (b) if it’s an old injury, he may not even be able to repair it (but he won’t be able to tell until he goes in arthroscopically).
Since I saw her last (when she was perfectly able to lift objects, raise her arms over her head, reach behind her back, etc.), I saw my father-in-law, who had just had rotator cuff surgery the week before. Prior to his surgery, he had almost zero use of his arm. Same deal with his OTHER shoulder surgery a few years earlier–massive loss of ROM. THIS was someone who needed rotator cuff repair. My mother doesn’t seem to be in the same league.
So now my mother and I are wondering, if she has no pain, no weakness, and no decreased range of motion … why bother with the surgery, which has many risks and drawbacks for someone of her age, health, and home situation? The only thing we’re worried about is that NOT repairing it now may greatly increase the risk of some massive injury/loss of function somewhere down the line, where she would (a) not be able to schedule the surgery so neatly (b) have much poorer repair options once the Dr. opened her up and © would have a much worse recovery.
Can any MDs shed some light on this? Is foregoing the elective surgery just asking for greater trouble down the line? Or, in contrast, is it instead stupid to do surgery in the first place if she has no current symptoms?
