Shoulder

To continue on the shoulder saga:

On Friday, I talked to a nice Orthopedic Surgeon. By “nice,” I mean “totally competent and told me what I needed to know.”

For one thing, he actually examined me. I know that this is at least half psychological, but the man kept putting hands on my shoulders, eyeballing the difference between the un-injured and injured one, walking around, gently aligning my arm, and so on. He may or may not have needed to do this for his diagnosis to be accurate, but it gave me a strong confidence that he knew what we was doing and was paying attention to me rather than just dealing with some anonymous report of a busted shoulder. That did a lot for my fear that I was being brushed off.

Then he took a shoulder model (plastic bones, ligaments, and muscles), and explained what I had done. He pointed out the three ligaments that are torn. Basically, I’ve torn all the ligaments that connect the arm-end of my clavicle to my shoulder. That’s a textbook “third degree” separation. He could tell this from the x-rays, and also from the physical exam. The bump on my shoulder is the end of my clavicle poking up.

The difference between a third degree, and the next three (fourth, fifth, and sixth) is the extent to which the soft tissue in my shoulder is holding things in place. When all that other stuff comes apart, you generally get surgery immediately. You tell that because the clavicle point is “up by your ear” rather than an inch or so out of position.

I start physical therapy in two weeks. I go back to the doc in six weeks. If I pass muster at the six week point, I’m allowed to return to exercise, “letting pain be my guide.”

Surgery might be necessary or it might not be. Apparently there’s no difference in the surgery whether we do it now or in a year. The indicator will be if the bone heals in the wrong place and I get a constant “click” and “pop” as it grates around in there. In that case, they’ll cut me open, re-sever a bunch of crap, and generally antagonize the joint. The fact that the soft tissue is holding things kinda in place now gives hope that it’ll settle back correctly on its own.

Word is that these usually heal completely. I’ll always have a bump on my shoulder, but I should be okay to return to whatever violent and dangerous activity I’m into by that point … hopefully before the summer is out!