Shoulder pain can be especially limiting for athletes, gym-goers, and anyone who needs to be able to reach overhead. It can limit your ability to perform work around the house and affect the way you sleep.

Common conditions of shoulder pain that we see include rotator cuff tears, labral tears, bursitis and shoulder impingement. People who have rotator cuff tears and labral tears do not have to get surgery! More often than not, our patients who have tears in their shoulder experience relief with our services and sometimes the root cause of their pain is coming from somewhere else.

The shoulder is actually comprised of 4 main joints being the sternoclavicular (SC) joint, acromioclavicular (AC) joint, glenohumeral joint and the scapulothoracic joint. Being able to individually assess these joints help us determine the main cause of dysfunction.

Sometimes the neck can be involved in cases of shoulder pain. Since it is a case-by-case basis, we always perform a thorough screen of the neck anytime we suspect it may be involved.

We perform a comprehensive evaluation to determine the root cause of individuals’ shoulder pain, as there are many different presentations and we believe that a “one size fits all” approach is not the best. Among the most common reasons for shoulder pain that we see on a regular basis is weakness of shoulder musculature or the surrounding muscles. Our goal is to determine which movements help your shoulder pain and give you a strengthening regimen to meet you where you are at.

Of course, pain and stiffness can be a huge limiting factor. We offer many different treatment options to help manage pain and discomfort based on your individual presentation of shoulder pain including:

• Joint mobilization

• Soft tissue mobilization/massage

• Myofascial release/cupping