Search
Close this search box.

Shoulder Pain and Injuries

Your shoulder is made up of the upper arm bone, which is called the humerus, along with the shoulder blade, or scapula. The place where these two bones meet is called the “glenohumeral joint.” This joint is surrounded by a joint capsule made of tough fibers. In normal conditions, most of your shoulder motion occurs at this joint.

Your shoulder joint is a ball and socket joint, where the top or head of the humerus is the ball and the shoulder blade provides the socket into which the ball fits. Your body works continuously to keep the ball in the center of the socket. This is analogous to a seal balancing a ball on its nose. That seal works quite hard at keeping his nose centered in the middle of the ball, keeping a delicate balance to assure that the ball does not fall off his nose.

In order to keep this balance of the ball on the socket, four muscles, known as the rotator cuff muscles, work to hold the ball securely in the shoulder joint socket. These four muscles attach to the humerus by the rotator cuff tendons, and they appear to surround the ball of the humerus like a glove. The rotator cuff muscles act dynamically in a delicate balance to keep the ball of your shoulder joint centered in the socket of your shoulder joint.

Shoulder problems are commonly caused by a breakdown of the soft shoulder tissues from participation in sports, overuse in daily activities and as we age. The most common shoulder injuries and conditions include dislocation, separation, and rotator cuff issues.

Treatment Options

Breg shoulder braces are innovatively designed to help you recover from injury, trauma or surgery comfortably.

To find out more about Breg shoulder braces, go to Breg Shoulder Braces.

 

If you and your doctor have decided surgery is the best treatment for you, your options may include surgery to repair or remove damaged tissue, fusion of bones or ankle replacement surgery

Other non-surgical options to help manage shoulder problems include cold therapy ranging from simple ice packs to motorized cold therapy (an insulated cooler with a pump and pads that deliver cold to specific joints), your doctor may suggest using cold therapy to reduce pain and swelling of an injured joint. All cold therapy, including ice, can be cold enough to damage your skin, so regardless of what kind of cold therapy you use, follow your doctor’s instructions.

Learn more about Cold Therapy

Enhancing Recovery with Exercise

Breg offers home therapy kits with instructions designed to help you perform the exercises you need to recover from your injury or surgery. Find out about Breg Home Therapy Kits.