Shoulder issues can range from minor irritation to debilitating pain. “Frozen shoulder” is a common injury that can have a negative impact on your daily life. The medical name for this injury is adhesive capsulitis and presents with pain, stiffness, and possible decreased range of motion.
Treat Frozen Shoulder Immediately
The longer it goes untreated, the worse the symptoms can become. Therefore, it is important to seek medical care promptly regardless of how minor you think your injury may be.
This injury may not always be the result of a traumatic event and symptoms may just appear. This condition comes with three stages; freezing stage, frozen stage, and thawing stage. During the freezing stage, movement in the shoulders may be painful and annoying and range of motion may begin to decrease. During the frozen stage, pain may be gone but range of motion gets progressively worse and may become absolute. The final stage is where the range of motion improves.
The progression of this injury is specific to the person affected. It may resolve on its own but can often take one to three years for the three stages to complete. With the range of motion of the shoulder affected so much, daily activities like getting dressed or getting something off a kitchen shelf can become next to impossible to complete. This is where treatment becomes imperative.
Chiropractic Treatment For Frozen Shoulder
Chiropractic care has been known to be affective in treating the pain associated with frozen shoulder. Treatment is specific to the patient and follows some general guidelines. First, the cervical and upper thoracic spine regarding range of motion is addressed.
The mobility of the neck and upper back directly affects the shoulders function. The area of the nervous system that is responsible for communicating with the shoulder also is present in the cervical spine, so this of course is important to focus on during the initial healing process.
Next our chiropractors will focus on the shoulder joint itself. The gleno-humeral joint and the acromion-clavicular joint (shoulder and collar-bone) are both joints that can restrict range of motion in the shoulder. By manipulating these joints, proper motion, position, and function can be restored.
Lastly, doing some range of motion exercises at home can help with increasing motor function of the joint. Wall crawl or flexion/extension are two that are recommended. There are also stretches will be recommend improving flexibility.
Call AICA College Park For Help
Our College Park chiropractors want to help you recover faster and with less pain and lifestyle impact. If you are plagued with frozen shoulder, call us at (404) 592-0319 and let us help you thaw out.