Please HELP: Scapula Winging & Shoulder Impingment. ADVICE URGENTLY NEEDED!

Hi, my name is Julian.

I’m a 27 year old male.

I have been suffering from a shoulder injury for three years now and all of the treatments I’ve had thus far have provided no relief from my pain and discomfort.

My injury is a lowered and ‘winging’ scapula (on my right side).

This must have, in some way, been caused by my previous heavy bodybuilding weight training, including very heavy ‘shoulder press’ and ‘bench press’ type movements.

As a result of my pain and discomfort, I’ve stopped training altogether.

My condition, though, has not improved at all.

The symptoms of my condition are:

• Very tense pain in my neck and trap, on the right side.
• Impingement pain when I raise my arms above my head to style my hair.
• A ‘numbness’ (difficult to describe) in my right buttock, and an uncomfortable sensation that runs down my thigh (It feels as though my entire right side is, somehow, being ‘pulled downwards’)
• Aching in my hip.

My MRI scan showed nothing unusual.

If you were to look at me ‘front on’, my right shoulder looks lower than my left.

I’ve been told that it is the mal-position of my scapula that’s causing my condition.

However, all of the Shoulder Setting and Stability exercises I’ve done have rendered no improvement at all.

I have, to date, seen 3 different physiotherapists.

I’ve also tried Deep Tissue Sports Massage, Acupuncture, Yoga and Osteopathy.

And yet, still no improvement.

It has now come to a point of tremendous frustration and anguish for me, having tried all of these things and experiencing no improvement at all.

I simply don’t understand why, despite so much effort, nothing’s worked.

I've also had a NERVE TEST. My results were normal.

I’m posting on this forum in the hope that a professional in the field may offer me or suggest an approach they feel may work, based on the information I’ve provided.

I look forward to your help.

Thank you.

Julian James

Hmmmm....Have you had an xray?? I know you've had an MRI but this would only rule out muscle or tendon tear. An xray is also valuable to rule out calcium deposits in one of your rotator cuff tendons or some bony abnormality around your shoulder which could be causing the impingement.

I think your leg/butt symptoms are likely to be related to your lower back - but the CAUSE of both shoulder and leg pain could be related.

To get on top of a shoulder impingement problem you need to strengthen your scapula stabilisers (shoulder blade) initially on their own and then work on strength exercises which incorporate your shoulder blade AND rotator cuff at the same time. You shoulder blade muscles are an important anchor to help take the load off your rotator cuff, but the timing and co-ordination of shoulder blade and rotator cuff together is important or else when you return to sport or activity you'll be repeating the same bad pattern. The other important muscle group is your "core" especially if you are wanting to return to body building. Just as the shoulder blade helps support the shoulder, your core helps support your entire upper limb activity so a lot of the force generation comes from good core strength - again taking some of the load off your shoulder. If your core is weak it can also cause lower back problems which puts pressure on your sciatic nerve which can cause butt/leg numbness. Is this all making sense. If I was you I would:
- get an xray of you shoulder
- see a physio to address your lower back problems
- get a good exercise progam which focuses on core strength, shoulder blade strength and rotator cuff strength starting with exercising these groups individually and then more complicated exercises which combine all of these muscle groups at once so you are co-ordinating using them all together.
- Taping your shoulder in to a better position can help reduce symptoms while you are waiting for your shoulder strength to build up. Taping can often help to reduce pain so that you can exercise better (your physio should be able to show you this)
- Stretching of your upper traps and your pec muscles is also important....especially your pec minor which is the smaller of the pec muscles (get your physio to show you) Check out my website if you need an exercise program

Thank you for your reply.

It's a shame you're not in the UK, or else I'd come to see you personally.

- Why do you think that I feel a 'pulling' on the entire right side of my body?
- When you say that I need to work on my CORE STRENGTH, do you mean do Swiss Ball work for overall stability and balance?

I'd like to know more about the EXACT Scapula and Rotator excercises to do. I have all of the different 'bands' and did lots of rotator work, but never experienced any benefit.

I'm quite happy to look into your programs, however I don't need 20 more excercises to do!!

What I need is to know the EXACT excercises to do, and in what order.

Julian

Hi again

I'm glad you got my program via email. Hope the advice helps. Good luck.

hi Julian
i'm curious can you explain what u were told by those therapists what happened to you and why in spite of treatment was no improvement?

did you feel any better/worse after treatments, if yes what methods you think helped/made it worse?


u asked why your side playing up?
i think its fascial pronblem.

can u give info

about your reactions on stress[ work, psychosocial ],

describe your posture,

what do you think about your technique when you trained?

hi again
have u got functional or structural lenth leg differe4nce?
scoliosis?
have you had always lowered and winging scap?
if not, did how/when it happen?
did you have any falls on your bum?

thanks