It’s been awhile since I’ve logged in. My shoulder started acting up in Dec/Jan, so I backed off from swimming. It continued getting worse since going inactive! An MRI from '05 shows a small SLAP tear. And fresher high-rez MRI from 3 months ago shows no tear. I’ve seen two orthos, both want to get in there and trim up some frayed areas, and if there’s truly a tear then anchor it down.
I hear nothing but bad stories about the rehab. 6 months. And I worry about it not fixing my troubles.
The other thing the orthos want to do (and I forget the name of it) is make more room in there under the bone at the top.
Two things:
if you’ve had one, did you recover fully?
how to find the best surgeon for this? I’ve got to assume they aren’t all the same…
September 24, 2008. SLAP repair and compartment release on the R shoulder.
They told me 3 weeks in a sling. I only had it for 3 days.
They said I should be able to get back in the pool by mid-February. I was able to get in the pool by early-Dec.
I had PT twice a week for 6 weeks (I think).
It was well worth it. I tore my labrum from a fall right after IMLP and did IMWI that same year in quite a bit of pain. It was a slow recovery, but, not even close to as slow as they predicted. It sucks. You are laid up and in quite a bit of pain. But, the end results are fantastic. I have full strength and full range of motion. No issues at all.
Forgot to address your second question – yes, you need a specialist. Absolutely. Preferably a sports med ortho.
I am in the Milwaukee, WI area. My “regular” ortho is Dr. Jamie Edwards. Dr. Edwards referred me to Dr. William Pennington, who he said was the only guy he would ever trust. Pennington has done shoulder repairs on Milwaukee Brewers and Bucks. He trained under the doc who developed (or perfected, I cannot remember) the current procedure for SLAP repair.
You definitely want someone who specializes in shoulders on athletes.
I had a slap tear in November. Read all the horror stories here and had to stop reading them.
Went to PT dutifully and was swimming again, carefully by late Feb. Now I can swim 3 times a week, getting back my fitness has been a challenge, but i usually do about 3000-3600 a session.
i’m not swimming like I was, but i can swim and I find as long as I keep up my exercises to strenghten the muscles that pull my shoulders back (to avoid the rolled forward shoulder), also all the rotator cuff muscles, and also do light weights for my chest muscles, it keeps the injury at bay. I do exercises 2-3 times a week. If I slack off, I feel it. If I don’t use it, I feel it.
The trick for me has been to really work on keeping the shoulder in its proper position by strengthening the muscles behind the shoulder blade, plsu the chest and rotator cuff, while also making sure to constantly stretch my chest muscles to keep the front of hte shoulder open.
anyways, just wanted to put some positive feedback out there.
Aztec - you and your doc have a significant advantage over the would be “experts” at ST. If the doc thinks that the SLAP is the cause or your distress, arthroscopic repair is fairly straight forward. And, it’s not a particularly hard procedure for a doc who does a lot of shoulder arthroscopy. I can’t tell you why the two MRIs seem to disagree. I don’t think you need a “world expert” but make sure your doc does at least 50 shoulder scopes a year.
The other portion of the operation you describe is called a subacromial decompression, if certain exam and xray findings occur. While you’re likely to hear the quickie success stories here, be fully aware that is takes some folks a year plus to fully recover from this type of procedure and patience can be a virtue. This may weigh on your timing of said procedure. Good luck.
I had tears in my labrum & rotator cuff which were repaired in 2006 along with the decompression mentioned earlier. Like you my MRI showed no labrum tear. The analogy a Dr. gave was that sometimes the labrum can appear like a piece of paper lying on a table during an MRI (i.e., you can’t tell it’s not attached to the table unless you try to pick it up). Prior to surgery, he was 100% certain of a tear based on my existing range of motion and his exam. He was right, my labrum was badly torn once he got in there.
Long story short…rehab and getting ROM back was bad. I followed the PT to the letter and full recovery took about 1 year for me (it was usable but crummy much sooner, 5-6 months). Several friends have had faster results than I did with the same procedure (particularly if their injury came from a trauma, not overuse. But, I have nothing to scientifically back up that claim.). Three years later and my shoulder continues to be problem free. The surgery was worth it for me.
With respect to finding a doc…I support the idea of locating a sports orthopedic surgeon who specializes in shoulders and who performs many procedures every year. If you’ve tried PT prior to surgery, I found that the therapists had a really good idea about the reputations of individual surgeons whose work they see on a daily basis.
Aztec - you and your doc have a significant advantage over the would be “experts” at ST. If the doc thinks that the SLAP is the cause or your distress, arthroscopic repair is fairly straight forward. And, it’s not a particularly hard procedure for a doc who does a lot of shoulder arthroscopy. I can’t tell you why the two MRIs seem to disagree. I don’t think you need a “world expert” but make sure your doc does at least 50 shoulder scopes a year.
The other portion of the operation you describe is called a subacromial decompression, if certain exam and xray findings occur. While you’re likely to hear the quickie success stories here, be fully aware that is takes some folks a year plus to fully recover from this type of procedure and patience can be a virtue. This may weigh on your timing of said procedure. Good luck.
They think it’s probably the source of the distress. One thinks the mild fraying at the edges may be it, and that merely trimming that up may fix it.
The recovery sounds awful, and the prospect of a year is just crushing when I’m already in my mid-40s. I don’t think I’ll do it unless my knee improves, so that I’ll have a reason to swim again and need that shoulder. Otherwise I don’t think I have enough reason to do it. I get through about 90% of normal life pain-free.
Try just the therapy, my Dr. thought I probably had a slap tear (shoulder hurt for 18 mo’s) but said an MRI would need to confirm and then surgery-long recovery OR, just go straight to PT and see what happens. Six weeks (sometimes only once a week due to travel, but did the drills at home daily) doing vigorous shoulder/back/chest band exercises and then eventually light weights and now good as new. The PT was fun and a great workout, can’t wait to get injured again and go back, used all kind of new things, bench press on foam rollers, shoulder press on ball, body blade, etc…