3 effective ways to deal with frozen shoulder

Frozen shoulder can be a really menacing issue. One day you feel right as rain, and the next day you are down with excruciating pain and restricted movement in your shoulder, to an extent that the movement is completely restricted.

2.4 per 1000 people every year becomes a victim of frozen shoulder. Women are more prone than men to suffer from frozen shoulder and it generally targets people belonging to middle age. The condition becomes a big barrier when it comes to doing daily activities, which can be really frustrating as it can stay with you for up to 3 years where it suddenly decides to vanish again as quickly as it showed up. However, in certain cases it can have ongoing symptoms.

What is the reason behind you suffering from Frozen Shoulder?

While the reason behind a frozen shoulder are far from being understood, what majority of experts agree upon is that there is a certain inflammation that occurs in the shoulder capsule, which is why it is termed as adhesive capsulitis – meaning shoulder capsule inflammation. Simplest way to remember – if you see a word that contains ‘itis’, it always point towards inflammation.

Osteopathic experts advocate that the reason behind frozen shoulder is your bicep tendon getting injured, displaced or leaking fluid into the shoulder capsule, which triggers a gigantic immune system response the causes a large cascade of inflammatory reactions.

Peter Mitchell, physiotherapist, suggests that the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) is associated with the cause of frozen shoulder as the SNS plays a key role in pain and dysfunction.

It is logical for the cause to be related with the nervous system as the nervous system controls most of the functions in the body. So, when it comes to internal injury, the SNS – fight/flight/stress – side of the immune system steps into hyper drive.

How useful is surgery?

While surgery is effective when it comes to loosening the joint capsule in some cases, it is not the best suited option for treatment as there are simpler and effective strategies that can help overcome the pain, assist in the shoulder regaining motion, and expedite your recovery.

Let us look at some of the easier methods to cure frozen soldier

1. Wide variety of motion exercises

If you are down with a frozen shoulder, you can’t lift your arm up very high as it ends up getting locked in a wing position close to your body. Hence, mild stretch exercises can be done to increase the range of motions in the joint and muscles.

However, when doing exercises, ensure that you don’t overdo it as you can end up stressing the tissues, which can lead to more pain and inflammation. This would be for a short duration but can leave you feeling extremely uncomfortable.

2. Manual therapies

A wide variety of manual therapies have been shown to offer relief to frozen shoulder, including massage with an effective ayurvedic cream like Moov, dry needling, acupuncture and kinesiology. Again, it is imperative for you to keep in mind that treatments should not be too forceful or they can hurt the tissue even more.

One thing manual therapies are good is in addressing the compensations that resides in other joints and muscles as a result of your frozen shoulder. Since your shoulder is immobile, this places intense pressure on other joints and muscle to perform.

Hence, with the help of manual therapies one can keep too many muscular imbalances at bay over the long term, which can cause other pain and problems.

3. Micros Point Stimulation Therapy

A study, published in Cochrane Database Systematic Review, has revealed that microcurrent therapy amplifies the body’s natural anti-inflammatory mechanisms and improves the recovery time by sending a targeted electrical pulse into target areas.

Moreover, research has shown that MPS therapy, such as Dolphin Neurotism, directly impacts the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) – the side that prompts calm/rest/healing, which all other therapy fails in doing. In order to heal frozen shoulder faster, you need to switch off the SNS and activate the PNS.