Conditions
What is going on with your shoulder
Short, plain explanations of the problems seen most often in this practice, each on its own page. None of this replaces an examination. If something here sounds like you, that is a good reason to be seen — not a diagnosis.
Start here
Seven things people come in about
If you are not sure which one describes you, call and say so. That is a normal way to start.
Rotator cuff tears
Pain reaching overhead, trouble sleeping on that side, an arm that feels weak. Therapy can improve the pain, but a full-thickness tear does not heal back to the bone on its own. The first job is finding out which kind of tear you have.
Read moreShoulder replacement
When arthritis has worn the joint out, the surfaces can be replaced. There is more than one kind of replacement, and the right one depends on the state of your rotator cuff.
Read moreReverse shoulder replacement
The operation that swaps the ball and the socket so the deltoid lifts the arm. It is what makes a shoulder with an irreparable rotator cuff treatable at all.
Read moreShoulders that still hurt after surgery
A replacement that never felt right, a repair that did not hold, an infection, or a shoulder nobody has been able to explain. A large part of this practice, and most of it referred in.
Read moreBreaks and dislocations
A shoulder broken in a fall, or one that keeps slipping out of joint. Some are fixed, some are replaced, and some do best left alone and watched.
Read moreFrozen shoulder
Adhesive capsulitis. The shoulder stiffens until tucking in a shirt or reaching for the seatbelt becomes difficult, and every attempt to push past it hurts.
Read moreGetting a second opinion
What to bring, what the visit involves, and why bringing the actual images matters far more than bringing the reports.
Read moreA word about what you have been told already
People often arrive with a report that uses words like tear, impingement, arthritis or bone-on-bone, and understandably read those words as a verdict. They are not. Two shoulders with the same words on the scan can need completely different things, because the decision turns on the size and pattern of the damage, on the muscle behind it, on your age, and on what you actually need the arm to do.
That is also why an examination matters. A great deal of what a shoulder surgeon needs to know comes from watching the arm move, not from reading about it.