Frozen Shoulder Symptoms, Causes, Diagnosis and Treatment

What is frozen shoulder?

It is a condition described as pain and stiffness in the shoulder joint. Normally its symptoms starts slowly, worsen with the passage of time. Surprisingly, it resolves within 1-2 years in most cases. The chances of experiencing frozen shoulder tends to increase in case of recovering from some medical procedure or condition which affects your arm’s mobility, for example mastectomy or a stroke. Its treatment involves certain stretching exercises, however in few instances; the doctor can suggest numbing medications and corticosteroids injection. In rare cases, surgery is recommended in order to loosen the patient’s joint capsule, enabling it to move freely.

What are the symptoms of frozen shoulder?

Normally, its symptoms develop gradually, in 3 stages. Every stage tends to last for some months. Let’s have a quick look to its stages:

Painful stage: clearly, during the stage, the person experience pain with even slight movement of the shoulder, whilst the range of motion of shoulder begins to get restricted.
Frozen stage: normally, pain starts to reduce during the frozen stage, though, the shoulder get stiffer, whilst the range of motion reduces notably.
Thawing stage: in the particular stage, range of motion starts to improve.

Furthermore, for some individuals, the pain gets worse particularly at night times.

What causes frozen shoulder?

Tendons, ligaments and bones which structure our shoulder joint, are basically covered in a connective tissue capsule. When the capsule tightens and thickens around your should joint, limiting the movement of your shoulder, frozen shoulder tends to occur.

Clearly, doctors have failed to understand why such happen to few individuals among the rest, even though the condition mostly strike individuals those have gone through prolonged shoulder immobilization, for example after the arm fracture or surgery.

How is frozen shoulder diagnosed?

While performing a thorough physical exam, the doctor can ask the patient to carry out specific actions, by this, the doctor will test out for pain, whilst assess the range of motion. Such can include:

Back scratch.
Opposite shoulder.
Hands up.

How is frozen shoulder treated?

In most cases, its treatment involves in managing the shoulder pain, whilst preserving the range of motion of shoulder to the greatest extent.

Few treatment options for frozen shoulder include:

Medications:

Few over-the-counter pain relievers, for example ibuprofen and aspirin can greatly help easing the inflammation and pain linked with the condition. Moreover, in certain instances, the doctor can prescribe stronger anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving medications.

Therapy:

With the help of an experienced physical therapist, you can learn different stretching exercises which can help you maintain mobility in the shoulder to the greatest extent.