Common Shoulder Injuries in Throwing Athletes

Is a big part of your life playing a sport that involves frequent overhead motions? You may have experienced at least one sports injury that’s kept you out of the game; it’s likely a shoulder injury. Swinging your tennis racquet overhead for 70 mile per hour serves or throwing a baseball for years puts more than normal wear and tear on your shoulder joint. 

Dr. Jonathan Shults, board-certified orthopedic surgeon and sports medicine specialist James Dean with Coastal Empire Orthopedics treat many types of shoulder injuries in throwing athletes. 

Your shoulder joint is the most flexible joint in your body; it rotates from front to back and side to side. The joint has many moving parts which make it flexible, but its wide range of motion also makes it vulnerable to many types of injuries. 

It’s important to make an appointment with our office at the first signs of shoulder pain when you’re an athlete. If you let it go on too long, you could be looking at months of rest and rehabilitation. Our team uses the most advanced methods available today, including regenerative medicine, to diagnose and treat your sports injury so that you can heal quickly and return to play. 

Following are the most common shoulder injuries in throwing athletes. 

Labrum tears 

The shoulder is a ball and socket joint. Your shoulder contains a tough lining of cartilage called the labrum that helps support and stabilize the joint. The labrum helps keep the ball of the joint in place and attaches to your ligaments and tendons.

A labrum tear is an overuse injury. Your shoulder is painful and begins to catch or lock. Surgery may be needed for a severe labrum tear.   

Rotator cuff tendonitis and tears

Your rotator cuff is composed of muscles and tendons around your shoulder joint. If you’re diagnosed with a rotator cuff injury, we determine whether your tendon is stretched or torn. 

If you don’t have a tear, you should recover with conservative treatment. If you have a full tear, surgery is required if you want to continue playing at a competitive level. The injury won’t heal on its own. Treatment of a partial tear depends on its severity and whether other components are involved. 

Impingement 

Impingement is another common shoulder injury in throwing athletes; baseball players are especially at risk. As a baseball player, you pull your arm backward before you throw. Repeating this motion thousands of times compresses soft tissue in your shoulder and squeezes the rotator cuff tendons between the bones of your shoulder blade and your upper arm bone, or humerus. 

Impingement can lead to a tear if left untreated. 

Instability

If you haven’t experienced shoulder instability, you probably know someone who has it. Years of throwing a ball can strain your ligaments beyond their limits, stretching them so that the rotator cuff weakens and can’t hold your shoulder in place. Your shoulder may start to shift position when you throw. You feel pain and weakness; you’re not able to throw with your normal strength. If you wait too long to treat shoulder instability, it can lead to shoulder dislocation. 

Treatment for shoulder injuries 

Many shoulder injuries can be treated conservatively. If that’s the case with your injury, you use the RICE method (rest, ice, compression, elevation) at home. You need patience with shoulder injuries; recovery can take weeks or months.

If you have severe inflammation and pain, we can administer a cortisone shot. Alternatively, we may recommend a platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injection, depending on the injury. Once the inflammation subsides, you may need physical therapy to build up strength in your shoulder joint and restore range of motion. 

Recovery from a shoulder injury depends on its severity. Dr. Shults lets you know if you need surgery. He explains why it’s needed and how it is going to help you. 

Call Coastal Empire Orthopedics or book an appointment online if you’re experiencing shoulder pain.