So as summer has arrived and we think about picking up that tennis racket or golf clubs for the first time since last summer then the prevalence of shoulder pain occurring starts the increase.
One of the most common causes of shoulder pain with these types of sports is shoulder impingement which is a loose term to describe structures that have become compromised during overhead sports and activities.
Some of these tissues are tendons which as a group are called your rotator cuff muscles which are small intrinsic muscles that create some stability around the shoulder. Unfortunately they become the big muscle stabilizers of the shoulder when imbalance starts to occur in the more dynamic and larger muscles that envelope the shoulder. When this happens then the tendons start to become inflamed and irritated as they aren’t accustomed to dealing with high levels of load on their own.
Also our joints position will dictate how muscles will work. Its so common these days that as we work we tend to slouch which leads to rounded shoulders and forwards head positions. This will impact joints like our shoulder blade that if they start to live in a rounded and protracted position then the rotator cuff muscles get leverage to work in a sub optimal way and eventually lead to these impingement due to excessive overload
We can carry out some tests to gives us a idea about what tissues and irritated but from my experience we have to tackle the surrounding joints to get a long lasting outcome otherwise this is a condition that can grumble on for months and months.
I will share a video which will hopefully help you visualise and see how these rotator cuff muscle can get picked on when we start to move less optimally.
So please do reach out if you are struggling to play tennis or golf at the moment or any activities that requires overhead reaching:
Thanks
Mario
Leave a Reply