Steroid injection hasn't worked?

[savagebaggagemaster]

Has this happened to anyone else?
Two weeks ago I (finally) got a corticosteroid injection into my shoulder along with a local anaesthetic. I thought initially that the pain was going away, but little by little within 2-3 days it had returned, to the point where I waking up again in the night with an aching arm and experiencing pains throughout the day. I have been avoiding painkillers as I can't take brufen related meds and the codeine was playing merry hell with my digestive system plus I was on it for 6 weeks and didn't want to become dependent!
I am so fed up with it as the movement in my arm is also severely restricted to the point where I can't change the gears in the car or take off my bra / tops!!
It's making me an extremely grumpy person and making it difficult to do my job as well.
Has anyone ever found relief from this injection beyond two weeks or do I need to call the physio / gp again? I know they won't offer me another injection (straight away anyway

[savagebaggagemaster]

Sorry I hit post by mistake!

What I meant to say was is I know they can't offer me another injection but does anyone have any idea about how to make this better in any way?

I really am at the end of my rope!

[Clymene]

Will they not give you a second injection? I needed two to fix my slipped disc. It reduces the inflammation that's pressing on the nerve doesn't it? So if it's still inflamed, it won't work?

[savagebaggagemaster]

I believe they won't give one within 6 months.

[farfallarocks]

You poor thing I have had similar and the injection took another week to really work. Also
You need to be doing the physio exercise really intensively once you can again

[limpingparrot]

I had shoulder problems with everything pointing towards frozen shoulder, had the steroid injection and no improvement at all. It turns out that the cup and ball of the shoulder are a bit shallow, so the second course of physio targeting these stabilisation muscles were the thing that improves it in the end. This was after 2 years of pain followed by 18months of various treatments. It still flares up occasionally now and can’t do extreme should movements still.

[AthelstaneTheUndeady]

Hi, @savagebaggagemaster, me too, right down to the grumpy snarly persona .

The injection didn't work for me, and still waiting for x-ray/ultrasound to see if I've badly torn the rotator cuff, or just slightly torn it. If it's badly torn then the injection won't have helped much anyway - have you had confirmation of what caused it?

In the meantime, I'm finding that 'yoga with Adrienne' (available in all good websites and youtubes) is helping me a bit, if not my arm. She does a few different head/neck/shoulder routines, and whilst I can't lift my arm for some of the grander moves, the release in tension in the surrounding muscles has helped me feel better.

what i actually want is my arm back, but there you go

[savagebaggagemaster]

Thank you for the replies so far and I'm sorry to hear you've all been experiencing similar.
With regard to physio I've been given exercises to do by myself, but they are really difficult to do due to the lack of movement and the pain. I guess this isn't helping matters! Has anyone gone to a private physio and if so, did it help?

[AthelstaneTheUndeady]

ah, that should be really, not

[AthelstaneTheUndeady]

I haven't, savage, so can't help there. There were none open in July when I did mine, and I'm a bit reluctant until I get my scans to see what the damage actually is.

[savagebaggagemaster]

@AthelstaneTheUndeady

Hi, *@savagebaggagemaster*, me too, right down to the grumpy snarly persona .

The injection didn't work for me, and still waiting for x-ray/ultrasound to see if I've badly torn the rotator cuff, or just slightly torn it. If it's badly torn then the injection won't have helped much anyway - have you had confirmation of what caused it?

In the meantime, I'm finding that 'yoga with Adrienne' (available in all good websites and youtubes) is helping me a bit, if not my arm. She does a few different head/neck/shoulder routines, and whilst I can't lift my arm for some of the grander moves, the release in tension in the surrounding muscles has helped me feel better.

what i actually want is my arm back, but there you go

Thank you! I've had an x Ray which didn't show anything unusual. The gp did mention the possibility of an ultrasound - I wonder if they'd send me for that next? I'm a bit scared of yoga as even sitting down and getting up off the floor is a massive effort to avoid "zinging" my arm. It's the only way I can describe the excruciating shooting pain which all of you will be familiar with I'm sure! I should give it a try though. I haven't done yoga for over 20 years so I'm a little bit stiff!
I'm hoping that there is still time for the jab to be effective judging by some of the previous comments...

[LarkDescending]

I found hydrodilatation better than a straightforward steroid injection for a frozen shoulder. They force a lot of saline in to free the joint, which is agonising going in but gave me such rapid relief that I was able to dress myself again without pain before leaving the room.

It still didn’t get me to “perfect” and I would have had the second one after 6 months had it not been for Covid. In fact getting Covid then flared my shoulder up badly for a couple of weeks but after that I have had no further problems with it and won’t need another injection.

[LarkDescending]

NB I am not suggesting catching Covid as a cure for a frozen shoulder!

[savagebaggagemaster]

Hydrodilatation sounds effective. Can I ask how long you'd had the issue before this was offered?

[LarkDescending]

I’d been having physiotherapy for a few months without improvement when the physio recommended hydrodilatation. As you say, the physio exercises were just too painful to do.

I did it all (physio and hydrodilatation) privately, so I was able to get quick appointments. Because I have a large excess on my health insurance I had to pay for it all myself, unfortunately!