Not to do exercises for frozen shoulder?

[SilkieChick]

I was diagnosed with the beginnings of a frozen shoulder a few weeks ago by a physiotherapist. She gave me some exercises to do which she said might help to shorten the duration of the problem.

I promptly got covid and shortly after that was on holiday...basically life got in the way and I haven't done any of the exercises yet and the condition hasn't really changed much for me so far.

Thing is, I'm seeing a lot of people say it just has to run its course and I'm wondering if doing any of the stretches will really make a difference - or just be time wasted and discomfort for no real improvement?

Fwiw my shoulder is not (yet) very painful, but uncomfortable some of the time, with certain movements.

Does anyone have experience of noticeably improving a frozen shoulder with exercise?

@Fuuuuuckit I think it’s clear that frozen shoulder is sometimes hard to diagnose and some PPs are probably describing rotator cuff injuries or some sort of other shoulder impingement. The idea of swimming with true frozen shoulder - yikes I can feel the horrendous zinger just thinking about it.

What you are describing is worlds apart from true frozen shoulder, it is an excruciatingly debilitating condition

Exactly.

If you do genuinely have the condition OP, please do try to fit in the exercises when you can.
The pathology of this isn't known well, it's quite a phenomenon, but documented studies are done on those who have suffered it.

During freezing, when the capsule starts to thicken and becomes inflamed, this is when most of the pain will occur. Patients stop moving the arm, not because they are unable to at this stage, but because it is too painful to move it. So they don't.

Frozen stage is when there's little to no mobility, because of the lack of room within the joint. Keeping constant with exercises at this stage can be really beneficial.

As mentioned above, a procedure can be done to manipulate it and restore ROM within the ligaments etc.

Best of luck. Best case scenario is you have something else going on with the shoulder.

You'll lose movement as the condition progresses, layering more and more scar tissue upon your tendons. You'll struggle to perform the exercises by the time you actually want to fix it.

Manual manipulation to break the adhesions will be exceptionally painful and a long, long wait.

I was very fortunate it worked - I'd had it in the other shoulder first a few years previously, so was determined I'd do everything possible to try and not lose the use of my right arm for an indefinite period this time round.

Just have to deal with tendinosis these days, which is a walk in the park in comparison.

and is still ongoing 2 years later after 3 proceedures with limited range of movement and pain when I push too far.

Have you had scans to rule other things out? Are you sure it’s frozen shoulder and not some sort of tendon injury like a partial or full thickness tear or impingement?

This is so interesting

I absolutely trust my Physio and think he is pretty much god!

He has always helped me recover from any injury super quickly and only ever have to see him two or three times but that is because I follow his advice and do the exercises he suggests ! If needed he also does needling, massage etc.

I have tennis elbow right now and I ignored if / rested for about 8 weeks. No improvement. Went to see Physio. He did some massage and recommended some exercise. I also have a b busy life, 3 kids full time work, single parent, big house to manage etc. i did the exercises five times over a week, took me less than 20 mins while I was watching tv or chatting to the kids

The recovery has been amazing.

I went to see him again after a week and have one more visit booked then i won't need to go again. The strength in my arm had increased by 200%. In a week!

Do the exercises it's really not that hard compared to the alternative

Thanks all for the range of informative/interesting/kick up the bum views on here!

I'll see about integrating some exercises into my day - worst case scenario they do nothing and I will just have to wait for the condition to progress through and improve. But I guess it's worth attempting to keep some mobility and possibly shorten the duration of things.

I'll probably go back to the physio again too for a review and see if she offers any more advice or opinion.

I had major joint surgery nine months ago and have been very diligent with seeing the physio and doing exercises. I've had a complication which, while not a frozen shoulder, has a similar pain level due to a muscular issue.

My surgeon has banned me from any physio or exercises as he feels it's exacerbating the problem, if not creating it in the first instance. It seems counterintuitive to me, as I need to improve my flexibility, but I'm going with his advice to stop it all. Physio is good but it isn't always the answer.

Get up 10/15 minutes earlier each day and do the exercises first thing, before you have a chance to put them off by doing something else. I haven't had frozen shoulder but I've had other issues that required daily exercises to fix - I put it off for months and suffered the pain, but once I got into the habit of doing the exercises (had to push myself to get into the habit, but its worth it), it was no hassle and improved my quality of living so much.
Try doing the exercises every day for two weeks and if there's no improvement after that then go back to the physio.

mrsplum2015 · Today 14:56

This is so interesting

I absolutely trust my Physio and think he is pretty much god!

He has always helped me recover from any injury super quickly and only ever have to see him two or three times but that is because I follow his advice and do the exercises he suggests ! If needed he also does needling, massage etc.

I have tennis elbow right now and I ignored if / rested for about 8 weeks. No improvement. Went to see Physio. He did some massage and recommended some exercise. I also have a b busy life, 3 kids full time work, single parent, big house to manage etc. i did the exercises five times over a week, took me less than 20 mins while I was watching tv or chatting to the kids

The recovery has been amazing.

I went to see him again after a week and have one more visit booked then i won't need to go again. The strength in my arm had increased by 200%. In a week!

Honestly mrsplum2015 - the sheer gut wrenching constant pain of a full on frozen shoulder is nothing like tennis elbow (I've had both). I play sports and like you, have an excellent physio and osteo that I regularly visit with all my muscular skeletal stuff and they work wonders. I do the exercises, rest and things improve. Naturally, they were my first port but I was horrified to learn that they couldn't unfreeze it. It just gradually got worse until I could hardly move. Also, they hadn't even heard of manipulation under local anaesthetic and it was only out of desperation/pig-headedness that I booked a consultation with an orthopaedic surgeon and found it could be cured quickly and painlessly.
My osteo said "in the old days" surgeons would manipulate under a general but that doesn't tend to happen now and people are just told to wait it out as it's considered to be self-limiting.
I think many posters are assuming that like tears and strains, a full on frozen shoulder can be prevented/cured by exercise and it can't. It makes you feel sick to even attempt to move it. My surgeon said that people get so desperate they tie their arms to stuff and jump down to stretch the capsule but they often faint with the pain before they land though! I didn't believe the treatment would work, especially so quickly, but it did and I'd urge anyone to at least Google "manipulation under local anaesthetic" to decide if it's an option for them.

A professional with training and experience gave them advice on how to improve it and help it ease quicker. They thought they'd do the opposite, and then are shocked it hasn't improved. So they complained to MN, which is known to have magic healing powers. And they wonder why its hard to take them seriously?

@Jalisco here, not bothering to read the thread, misrepresenting it and making herself look like a right tit.

@PuppyMonkey

@Jalisco interpretation sounds pretty bloody spot on to me

@Endlesslypatient82 so you both must have missed the many posts where lots of us confirmed doing physio makes bugger all difference with a frozen shoulder? Including the post directly before @Jalisco . OP was asking for people’s experiences of a condition not many people understand.

But how does what you’re saying differ from @Jalisco interpretation?

did a medical professional with a specialism in this field advise the OP to do the exercises? Yes
Did the OP ignore? Yes
Did the OP instead ask Mumsnet. A parenting chat forum? Yes
Will she now do them because some people said “yes”? Yes

Thankfully the op has ignored you and will at least give the exercise a try.

you tried them. They didn’t work.
very different from…
never having tried them once

Well yes if you don't do physio recommended, nothing will change. That's kind of obvious. You could have done them by now with all the time you've taken to read replies and reply to them as well. Do them while you're watching a TV show. That's what I did when I broke part of my body. I can now walk (I couldn't before), I don't get pain any more when I walk, I can do sports, go to the gym etc. It only hurts for horse riding and given what I did that was always going to be the case. But following physio did help, and you won't know if it will help until you try it. So just make yourself do it, it won't take that long. Mine took ages, and you try lifting your pelvis off the bed after you've broken it in half and your hips and lost the ability to walk! It's not easy. 😂

Wow, some being a bit harsh here and also not reading the thread - or perhaps misunderstanding my intention.

To be clear, I respect the advice of physios - that's why I went to one and will do again if I feel it's needed.

I came into MN to get a wider range of opinion/experience as I only know one other person who's suffered from this.

My life has been extremely busy - abnormally so - of late, with covid (me, then whole family), a holiday, a change of job, then typical summer holiday chaos. I have deprioritised this issue BECAUSE it hasn't felt much worse. I am not complaining that I haven't seen improvement, despite doing nothing, that would be ridiculous.

I expect this shoulder will get worse and more painful in time (assuming correct diagnosis) no matter what I do.

Will I try some exercises - yes. Is it likely I'll fail to keep them up regularly? Also yes.

Anyway, thanks to those who've helped and I'll now go and get on with my life, frozen shoulder or no frozen shoulder!

My frozen shoulder froze completely, with the tear-inducing pain mentioned by others, in spite of all my attempts to stop it in its tracks with physio etc. I had an ovarian cyst pop and the pain of that was nothing compared to accidentally touching the door frame with my right (useless) arm. It quite literally took my breath away and left me sobbing. I'd advocate doing the exercises, of course, but be aware it may well still be hell on earth with no sleep and kill me now pain till it blissfully eases. It took me 2 years to be pain free, and only now, 4 years on, do I have more or less full range of movement. My sympathies OP. It is not fun.

I paid to see a private Orthopaedic surgeon who subsequently booked me in for a manipulation under local anaesthetic. Basically, the band of cartilage needs manually stretching/releasing but the pain of moving a frozen shoulder means that an individual can't do this with a few daily stretches. The procedure was nothing short of a miracle (I can't stress that enough!) and I was pretty much back to normal the next day with full, pain free movement! I asked why I hadn't heard about this via the NHS route and he said it's simply cost. The bad news is that if you get one frozen shoulder, you're more likely to get the other freeze but at least I know what to do. Apparently, frozen shoulders vary from person to person but you can't stop them and the full freeze is terrible.

I had the manipulation under anaesthetic on the NHS. That and post-procedure physio and exercises for a few months sorted it. But you have to commit to the programme.

Previously tried physio and exercises alone and they had minimal effect (not zero, but not nearly enough) but as that stage it had been misdiagnosed as a rotator cuff injury so maybe not the right set of exercises. After that I asked my GP to refer me to a specialist for surgery (I didn't want the steroids as they seemed to be a painkiller masking but solving the issue), and it was only when I had a scan they worked out what it was, and sent me in for the MUA.

To be clear, I respect the advice of physios - that's why I went to one and will do again if I feel it's needed.

Clearly, you don't respect the advice of the physio. Physio only works if you do it. The fact that you are busy is irrelevant. You're not even trying the exercises or half-arsing them occasionally.

I'll probably go back to the physio again too for a review and see if she offers any more advice or opinion.

What would be the point of that, when you have already rejected her advice?

If you want a second opinion, get a second opinion.

I had frozen shoulders on both sides, one after the other, lasting 5 years in total. I had nhs physio both times, steroid injections, did exercises etc - nothing helped. Went through all the stages of classic frozen shoulder, it was very painful both times with limited movement - couldn’t dress easily and couldn’t raise my arm on the affected side. My elderly mother also had a frozen shoulder many years before me and told me it would run its course and she was right! A year later I’m now back to normal and am able to lift light/moderate weights in the gym with no problem. At the time I didn’t think this would happen, it’s bizarre to now be totally pain free with full range of movement.

Op you respect the advice of anonymous posters on a parenting forum. Not the advice of a physio.

That's the problem and she doesn't know these people. They might have been like her and didn't bother doing the exercises as often as you should. We don't know because they are anonymous. It's amazing how many people will take advice off of strangers who they have never met over the advice of a professional. Professionals aren't always right, but I'd rather listen to them than Jane down the street who is giving advice while watching grey's anatomy.