# Need advice on a frozen shoulder after breaking collar bone.



## Speeder500 (Oct 9, 2012)

I broke my collar bone about 1.5 months ago. I had surgery to fix it about 5 weeks ago. First 2 weeks were in sling before surgery, next 4 weeks were out of sling but with limited range of motion and never above shoulder height. 

I was told not to lift my arm above shoulder height for 6 weeks.

I decided to start trying to lift it early at 4 weeks because the pain was gone and I now can only lift my right arm somewhat above shoulder height and not straight up. 

I am in my mid-30's and in good health. I have no pain when trying to lift it until I start forcing it at the point it stops. 

I am worried about this because I was applying for a city job which requires a difficult medical.

Can anyone give me any advice on this and if you had a frozen shoulder? How long did it take for yours to resolve? Did you force it?

Thanks


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## 11053 (Sep 19, 2009)

Sorry man, but you are likely in for a world of hurt and frustration for several months.
My personal take on a lot of shoulder injuries is that immobilization is detrimental.
I've broken collarbones, separated shoulders, dislocated shoulder, torn bicep tendon, torn deltoid, fractured scapula etc.
Used to rock climb at a fairly high level for many years and still MTB/DH almost daily after " career ending" shoulder injuries.

The frozen shoulder thing is a headache and puzzling.
First there is pain and lack of mobility.
Then pain lessens but mobility does not improve.
Attempts to improve mobility can increase pain but provide no mobility gains.
Eventually pain lessens and mobility improves.
Seems to be several months to a few years of headache for many sufferers.
The big risk is that immobility is so bad that you end up tweaking your neck, back, etc in compensation.
The condition will eventually resolve.
I suggest aggressive PT/rehab and forcing yourself back to gaining mobility.
Don't settle for the BS doc recommendation that "it should resolve on it's own if you give it time" if you have future athletic goals and expectations.


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## patrickd72 (Jul 24, 2008)

Can I ask who diagnosed you with Frozen shoulder? Just doesn't add up based on a broken clavicle. Which has nothing to do with the glenohumeral joint. That is what freezes up. You would not be able to hardly move your arm at all and have extreme pain. Sounds like you have decent ROM, but are not satisfied and not following the post op instructions? It's not frozen shoulder based on your description. Is this a google diagnosis? Sounds like it. If you broke your clavicle and it needed surgery it must have been pretty displaced. Most are treated without. You had a fracture and surgery, with fixation no less. Give it time. Sorry, but it is early in the game and sounds like your expectations are not reasonable.


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## Vegard (Jul 16, 2009)

I had restricted rom after my clavicle break (due to inactivity because of the sling), I fixed it on my own after using some exercises I found on youtube.






The one that starts at around 7.00 is especially helpful.


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## Speeder500 (Oct 9, 2012)

Vegard said:


> I had restricted rom after my clavicle break (due to inactivity because of the sling), I fixed it on my own after using some exercises I found on youtube.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Thanks I'll take a look. How long did it take you to get your range of motion back in your shoulder.


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## Vegard (Jul 16, 2009)

Mine was a bit different from yours because I broke mine july 7th '14, then got 'treated' conservatively for 3 months before getting surgery. All in all I was out 6 months.

I started my own ROM regime 4 weeks post surgery, about 4-6 weeks after that I had full ROM with slight discomfort. The discomfort should dissipate quickly after restoring full motion.


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## Chicane32 (Jul 12, 2015)

I've had two different shoulder injuries and they both required extensive rehab. The worst was a AC joint separation which had my shoulder in a sling for 8 weeks.This lack of movement causes your muscles to deteriorate and become week. This is likely what you have and it will take several weeks, if not a month to build your muscle back up. The first exercise to get my motion back was. Lay down on your bed, hold a broom stick or some type of stick at your waist with both hands and slowly try and lift it back over your head. Your good arm will help lift up you week arm. Each time you will get more motion back in you bad shoulder. Look up rehabbing your shoulder as mentioned and you will find several different exercised to do. Stop by a rehab facility and see if they will give you a stretchy latex rubber band. Tie one end to a door knob and with your elbow bent, there are four different exercises to start building up your muscle by pulling on the rubber band. From there it's weights. Good luck


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## Speeder500 (Oct 9, 2012)

I finally got rid of most of my frozen shoulder. I was slowly getting better then I finally grabbed the pull up bar with my bad shoulder and slowly put more weight on my arm stretching that sucker out.

I heard that they break frozen shoulders by putting people asleep, so I figured that breaking it on my own would be fine as I could stop if I felt something not right.

I had to relax the muscles to get a good stretch. It really didn't hurt all that bad as I slowly put more weight on it. I heard a couple of odd noises but nothing serious.
The next day I noticed I was able to really get my arm back much further and then getting the rest of the range was easy from that point. I just actually hung on the bar again with both arms and lifted my feet up. 

I still have muscle weakness as getting my arm up still hurts a bit but it does go back to where it should. It feels weird to have the range back, it almost feels like my arm shouldn't go back that far, but that is only because I had a limited range for so long. 

So best way to get rid of a frozen shoulder is to just stretch the damn arm out. I believe it is scar tissue that will have to be broken, the earlier you do it the easier it will break.

But I could be wrong here.


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