Osteoarthritis of the shoulder joint is accompanied by swelling, severe pain in the shoulder and limited range of motion. The causes and symptoms of the disease, existing methods of treatment and ways to help at home will be discussed later in the article.
What is shoulder osteoarthritis
The shoulder joint is quite complex in structure and is the most flexible of all, offering the human body the most complete range of motion. The joint capsule of the shoulder can stretch very much, allowing a person to raise their arm vertically and thus perform rotational movements. This activity weakens the ligaments, and as a result of the sharp bending of the tendons, mild ischemia often occurs in them.
It is the lack of nutrition of the joint tissues that poses the main danger of its destruction and gives impetus to the development of pathology.
The disease, which manifests itself primarily in the degeneration of the tissue of the shoulder joint, is referred to as arthrosis of the shoulder joint or shoulder arthrosis. The biomechanics of the shoulder is based on the correct functioning of all components: normal nerve conduction, good blood supply, correct anatomical structure. Violation of any of these conditions invariably causes internal tissues to begin to deform, leading to discomfort, limitation of movement, and pain.
Arthrosis (or osteoarthritis) is primarily a disease that is not inflammatory but degenerative in nature. It is associated with ischemic processes in the surrounding tissues, caused by various reasons.
This disrupts the nutrition of the joint, causing the thin and elastic layer of hyaline cartilage that covers the bone head to thin. The hyaline cartilage becomes less elastic and thinner, making normal movement difficult, causing the joint space to narrow.
This phenomenon prompts the body to take action, and bony outgrowths called osteophytes form at the edges of the joint. They are osteophytes that injure muscles and ligaments with their sharp edges and cause chronic, sluggish inflammation.
The main danger of osteoarthritis is that a slight reduction in mobility in the hand will inevitably lead to a reduction in range of motion.
Without movement, the shoulder begins to suffer from the accumulation of salts in the tissues surrounding the joint and from the deterioration in the nutrition of the joint tissues. Over time, this is fraught with the formation of joint contractures that limit the ability to move, or a complete loss of shoulder mobility and disability of the patient.
Causes of osteoarthritis of the shoulder
The only cause of shoulder osteoarthritis is deep ischemia, that is, a sharp or gradual deterioration in blood supply to certain tissue areas and depletion of joint nutrition. However, this reason is caused by factors that may be present individually or simultaneously in the anamnesis:
- shoulder injury. These can be both obvious injuries resulting from a car accident or a fall, and hidden muscle and ligament tears caused by exercise or hard work. Any joint injury always has the ability to remember itself, since the affected areas are not restored to their full size, and the conduction in them is invariably disrupted. The body can successfully cope with this over several years or decades until the aging process begins.
- Age-related changes in the body.
- Attacks of infection that cause arthritis.
- Metabolic and hormonal disorders, often age-related.
- Hereditary or genetic predisposition.
Stages and symptoms of arthrosis of the shoulder joint
The disease in its development goes through several stages. Since osteoarthritis is a chronic disease that progresses rather slowly, the first stage, in which joint deformities can be treated most effectively, is neglected by most patients.
- First stage symptoms. For the first time, when moving the hand, the patient may experience some discomfort already with a thinning of the hyaline cartilage. A sharp swing or jerk is not accompanied by pain, since the cartilage does not have nerve endings, and its destruction does not cause pain. But sometimes in the evening or at the end of training, pain in the shoulder begins to bother. They often ignore this and attribute it to muscle pain or neuralgia. And the disease began almost asymptomatically, and if no immediate measures are taken, it will go to the second stage.
- Second stage symptoms. If the patient feels pain when moving his hand, accompanied by a clearly audible cracking noise, then osteophytes have formed in the joint. From that moment on, the shoulder is constantly injured by the sharp edges of the bone outgrowths, which leads to inflammation of the surrounding tissues. This is manifested by morning stiffness that disappears only after the joint has developed, or by pain with habitual physical exertion or evening fatigue.
Well-being deteriorates because a chronic focus of inflammation in the body impairs general well-being. The joint can be more painful at night, in wet weather and in the off-season.
The patient severely limits the volume and amplitude of arm movements and cannot raise them more than ninety degrees in both the frontal and lateral planes. This leads to muscle atrophy and a significant deterioration in the nutrition of joint tissues.
- Third stage symptoms. Usually, when a patient comes to the doctor with the third stage of the disease, he is practically unable to move his hand. The hand does not rise, is not pulled back to the side, the joint swells and increases in size. The muscles atrophy and the pain syndrome is so strong that when you try to raise your hand, there is a tremor in your fingers. In most cases, the presence of contractures in the shoulder joint, the "frozen shoulder" syndrome, is noted.
Ways to treat shoulder osteoarthritis
In fact, it is impossible to cure osteoarthritis, and even more so, it is impossible to do it at home. This disease is so dependent on many internal and external factors that it is almost never the root cause.
However, the good news for patients in the first and second stages of the disease is that the development of osteoarthritis can be stopped. That is why doctors insist on early diagnosis of the disease and the start of treatment for shoulder arthrosis, when the joint tissue is only partially destroyed, there are no osteophytes, and you can try to restore normal nutrition to the joint.
Conservative therapy
The treatment of arthrosis always has two goals: eliminating the pain and, if possible, restoring the supply of the joint with the substances necessary for normal operation.
- The absorption of nutrients into the tissues depends on what the patient eats. Diet for osteoarthritis should exclude salt and alcohol. Also undesirable are meat products and vegetables that contain purine bases that increase the level of uric acid in the body. Steamed milk and vegetable dishes are recommended.
- The combination of medicinal preparations containing glucosamine and chondroitin, as well as collagen, which nourish the joint tissue. And daily use of regular gelatin in the form of jelly helps to enrich the diet with animal collagen.
- Local application of various warming, anti-inflammatory and chondroitin-containing ointments and balms activates blood circulation in the tissues surrounding the joint.
- If the pain syndrome is mild, the use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs is not recommended. When hand movements are accompanied by severe pain, NSAIDs can numb and reduce inflammation. These medications can help relieve pain.
- If the shoulder swells and an inflammatory process begins in it, a compress from the ointment set at night or rubbing with gels will have an excellent effect.
- Remedial gymnastics is an indispensable part of a successful treatment of shoulder arthrosis. However, it is not recommended to overload the joint, since improperly distributed effort can lead to rapid destruction of hyaline cartilage.
Therapeutic exercises for shoulder arthrosis and the rules for their implementation
Special exercises help to develop the joint and give it mobility. Gymnastics can be done independently at home. The main rules for conducting exercises should be:
- regularity, that is, it is necessary to do exercises every day for at least 15 minutes;
- Perform exercises smoothly and without much effort. This is necessary in order not to damage the joint structures even more;
- to gain moral pleasure during physical activity, which contributes to the normalization of the patient's emotional state.
Movement therapy exercises are recommended, during which hand movements do not cause pain. They are performed slowly, forcing the ligaments and muscles to gradually warm up and stretch.
- We offer the simplest and most useful exercises for osteoarthritis of the shoulder joint:
- Sit in a chair and put your hands on your knees. Make circular movements with your shoulders: 5 times forward, then 5 times back.
- Raise your straight arms up, pull your shoulders and shoulder blades back as high as possible. Hold for a few seconds, then lower. Repeat 5-7 times.
- Straight arms with palms spread down. Bend your wrists at the wrists, fingers should look up. Make circular movements with your shoulders: 5 times forward, then 5 times back.
- Raise your bent arms above your head while the fingers of one hand should rest on the elbows of the other hand. Gently move your arms back until you feel a stretch in the shoulder joint. Do the exercise 5-7 times.
- Place the palms of both hands behind your head with the backs of your hands facing down. Move your arms so that your palms fall down along your back into the area between your shoulder blades. Repeat the exercise 5-7 times.
- Place your left hand on your right elbow, bring your right hand over your left shoulder as far as possible until you feel a stretch in the shoulder joint. Do the exercise 5-7 times. Switch hands and repeat the exercise with the other hand.
In the treatment of arthrosis of the shoulder joint, manual therapy, physiotherapy and spa treatments are recognized as effective. The use of methods of traditional medicine is also considered justified.
Folk remedies and help at home
The main folk remedy for the treatment of arthrosis of the shoulder joint is herbal medicine, which allows the use of dry herbs and herbal decoctions for compresses, the preparation of ointments and rubbing at home to normalize metabolism and restore joint nutrition to relieve pain .
- Ointment. Take 10 grams of dry hop leaves, sweet clover, St. John's wort. Finely chop the herbs and grind together, add Vaseline and mix all the ingredients thoroughly. Apply the finished ointment to the shoulder area. This helps reduce pain and inflammation in the joint.
- Rub. Pour five parts of vodka or alcohol with one part of the crushed swamp rosemary flowers. Then you need to keep the drug in a warm, dark place for 24 hours. The tincture is applied externally to rub the affected joints.
- Decoction. Corn stigmas (2 tablespoons) pour two glasses of water, boil for 10 minutes, strain and drink a tablespoon four times a day.
- Compress. For a compress you need to brew 30 grams of dry oatmeal in two glasses of water. Apply the prepared mass to the sore shoulder for 30 minutes.
Alternative treatment for osteoarthritis of the shoulder
- Manual techniques - massage, manual therapy sessions, osteopathy - allow you to release muscle blockages, tension and spasms, and to release the blood vessels and nerves leading to the joint.
- Physiotherapy, especially shock wave therapy, balneotherapy, peat therapy and other methods are not recommended during an exacerbation, that is, when there is an active inflammatory process in the joint.
- Remission is an excellent reason for a course of treatment, after which permanent improvement occurs.
Surgical treatment of shoulder arthrosis
With a pronounced pain syndrome that prevents the patient from leading a normal life, the doctor may recommend surgery.
Most often, prosthetics are performed, that is, the destroyed joint is replaced with an endoprosthesis. If possible, a partial arthroplasty is then performed, in which only part of the shoulder joint is changed.
In rare cases, surgery is resorted to, since any surgical intervention, especially related to the installation of an intra-articular prosthesis, can lead to complications and a long recovery period.
Arthrosis of the shoulder joint is an insidious and dangerous disease in which a person's motor activity is disrupted and a fairly severe pain syndrome is noted.
It is important to treat this disease in a timely manner at the first mild symptoms to prevent further destruction of the joint.
The patient must keep in mind that the successful treatment of osteoarthritis depends more on their efforts and activity than on medication.