Special Needs Kids Lose Their Rights

Suffering a rotator cuff tear is one of the most common injuries to the shoulder.  Around 8 million Americans will visit their doctor about a shoulder injury this year and somewhere around 60% of them will have damaged the rotator cuff. A few will need surgery but the vast majority will manage to get their shoulders back to fitness simply by doing specific rotator cuff exercises to strengthen this often neglected group of muscles.

So what do these muscles do and why are they so susceptible to injury.  Okay, imagine your shoulder joint as a soccer ball resting on a plate.  Your shoulder is a ball and socket joint similar to your hip.  The main difference between the two joints is that in the shoulder the socket of the joint is very shallow, so the analogy of a ball on a plate is fairly accurate.

The shallow socket gives a large range of movement but at a cost.  It is fairly easy for the ball to slip out of the socket.  So the rotator cuff muscles are there to stabilise teh joint and hold it together as we move.  These are four very small muscles that attach to the shoulder blade and then surround the shoulder joint before attaching to the upper arm bone.  All these muscles do is stabilise the shoulder and they only really get used to any great extent when we lift our arms above shoulder height.

As we get older the muscles start to weaken through lack of exercise, but we tend to be unaware of this until we ask them to start working.  Playing Golf, throwing a ball with the kids, reaching up for something or lifting something above our heads, each of these movements put a sudden strain on our rotator cuff and can damage them.

Apart from day to day wear and tear we can also damage the cuff through repetitive movements.  Baseball pitchers will often wreck the rotator cuff, anyone whose work means constantly reaching up can do the same, shelf stackers working above shoulder height are putting strain on these muscles.

Because we don’t consciously use our rotator cuff it is a difficult group of muscles to exercise, but because weakness in these muscles is a main cause of shoulder damage, strengthening and exercising them is often the route back to full fitness.

But first, you need to rest.  Let the muscles repair by resting them.  Doing shoulder exercises just after an injury is simply going to lead to a worse injury.  You cannot work through this type of injury, you need to rest it and let it heal, doing passive non load bearing exercises to keep the joint moving for two or three weeks.  By all means take some anti-inflammatory drugs and pain killers but be careful of using your shoulder if you are masking the pain as you can do more harm than good.

Once the muscle is feeling better it is possible to start specific exercises aimed at strengthening and developing the rotator cuff muscles.  These will always be exercises with low weight or low resistance.  Try to avoid any pain during exercise as this suggests that you are damaging the muscle not strengthening it.

Most rotator cuff problems can be fixed by exercise alone but if you are in the small minority that need surgery you will still need to exercise these muscles after surgery as part of the treatment and to avoid future injuries.

Look after your shoulders, both of them, not just the one that’s let you down.

Technorati Tags: Analogy, Ball And Socket, Baseball Pitchers, Extent, Fitness, Joints, Lack Of Exercise, Playing Golf, Repetitive Movements, Rotator Cuff Muscles, Rotator Cuff Repair, Rotator Cuff Tear, Shallow Socket, Shoulder Blade, Shoulder Height, Shoulder Injury, Shoulders, Soccer Ball, Upper Arm Bone, Wear And Tear

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