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Anyone have experience w/ Shoulder Labrum Tears??

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Posted 7/30/2009 2:54 PM (GMT 0)
I've been in chronic pain for about 10 years.  My shoulders used to dislocate all the time from wrestling in High School (10 years ago).  After seeing about 3 doctors, one finally noticed that I had a labrum tear in my RIGHT shoulder.  I had Arthroscopic Surgery to fix it, but the pain just switched to my LEFT shoulder.  I had another doc look at that shoulder at some point and that labrum was also torn.  So I had Arthroscopic Surgery on that shoulder.  Now pain is in both shoulers/lats/scapula regions!!  Well, the first shoulder I had surgery on now has another tear... But this time, it's a posteror labral tear.  And I imagine if I were to get an MRI of the other shoulder, it would be torn again too.

What gives?  A few questions for anyone who knows anything about shoulder mechanics...

1) Can torn labrums cause severe chronic pain--I mean they are SOO tiny.

2) What do you do if your labrum just keeps on tearing?  Despite not leading a rough lifestyle anymore(haven't since I quit wrestling in 98--when the pain began).  Obviously neither surgery worked on either shoulder.

3) At some point can you just get a mini-shoulder replacement, considering my labrums that God gave me clearly aren't up to par.  Apparently they are just predisposed to tearing.

Anyway, any info would be greatly appreciated... I'm at my wits end....

Posted 7/30/2009 4:05 PM (GMT 0)
I don't have any answers for you.  I just wanted to show my support.  I am sure someone will be along shortly with more experience with this.  I am very sorry you are in such pain.  Please take good care.  I hope you can find some relief soon.
Posted 7/30/2009 5:47 PM (GMT 0)
Thanks Gretchen... I'm just trying to figure out if I should have another surgery--which really was a piece of cake or if it would just be a waste of money.  And see if anyone else has had troubles w/ their labrum(s).  There isn't much literature about it on the internet.
Posted 7/31/2009 2:15 AM (GMT 0)
Hi Murray,

I've had labral tears in my shoulders & multiple surgeries on both shoulders due to injuries from competitive swimming (although only one was to fix the actual labrum, the others were for other injuries). The labrum is essentially the cartilaginous lining of your joint & it helps lubricate your joint, as well as maintaining stability. Torn labrums can certainly cause chronic pain, as without the smoothness of the labrum, the head of your humerus will click & pop in & out of the joint & this can result in ligament, tendon, & muscle damage.

As for what you can do to prevent/correct this, that is a question for your surgeon. Like the meniscus in the knee, sometimes, the labrum can be removed, if successive attempts to fix it fail, but that would result on a bone-on-bone interaction in your joint & would end up causing arthritis. I've heard of this being done, but don't know how common, or plausible it is. The best person to advise you here is your orthopedic surgeon. If you aren't already seeing a shoulder specialist, you may want to consider doing so. There are different branches of orthopedic surgery, and you'd want to see a sports medicine surgeon, with a subspecialty in shoulders. Shoulders are complicated joints & there is a lot that can go wrong if you aren't working with a doctor that works on shoulders regularly. Even so. it took me about a year & a half to recover from each of my surgeries (baring any complications, and I had my fair share of those).

Skeye
Posted 7/31/2009 11:31 AM (GMT 0)
Wow... Great reply. Thank you very much Skeye!
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