Physical Therapy Success Story #1
Today’s blog will be a little different. Instead of writing about physical therapy or ways to stay healthy, I want to share a success story from one of my recent patients. I’ll call him Jim.
Jim’s Story
I first met Jim by happenstance a couple months ago when I was treating one of his friends and they happened to be at the same house. Jim’s friend mentioned how much better he felt after our session and Jim decided spur-of-the-moment to see me as well. He was having elbow pain that was keeping him from doing his normal exercise routine, and in particular, he was having a lot of pain with pushups.
Jim’s a pretty active guy – not a high-level athlete but certainly athletic and likes to work out several times per week. After I examined his elbow, I found that the pain appeared to be coming from his triceps. That’s not an unusual place for an injury, but it was a little strange that he was having so much pain in that area for the amount he was training, so I decided to look up the arm to the shoulder and neck. Good thing I did, because I found a lot more irritation in his rotator cuff and neck muscles on the same side as his elbow pain, as well as weakness in that rotator cuff. While not intuitive, there is a lot of research looking at the connection between the neck and shoulder to the arm that has found that treating the neck and shoulder can substantially improve elbow pain and function.
I explained to him what was going on and told him I would like to take a three-pronged approach: do some hands-on work to the triceps to decrease the irritability of the muscle, do some hands-on work in the shoulder and neck regions, and strengthen the shoulder. That first day, I dry needled and cupped his neck, rotator cuff and triceps, performed some trigger point release techniques on the triceps, and showed him a couple basic exercises to begin strengthening the muscles that were weak in the shoulder. After all this, he did a couple pushups and told me the pain was reduced by over 50% compared to the start of the session!
Jim was going to be out of town for about a month after our visit and said he’d follow up if he was still having pain when he got back into town. True to his word, I got a text from him at the end of December asking if I was available to come back out to his house. Over the past month and a half, I have seen Jim 3 times, following roughly the same procedure I outlined above. Jim is now back to performing his workout routine with almost no pain and is not concerned that his triceps pain will keep him from doing any of his HIIT workouts.
We’re here to help
This is just one example of the improvements I see in patients every week. If you have an injury that is keeping you from working out, skiing, or anything else that is an integral part of your life, I would love to help!
Western Slope Rehab and Performance is Here to Help
If you are struggling with injuries or have recently been in a motor vehicle accident, we can help. We are a physical therapy company that provides home-based orthopedic services in the Grand Junction, CO, area, as well as telehealth appointments throughout Colorado. If you would like to schedule a free consultation, you can call us as 970-462-9177, or fill out our contact form here.
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