The Best Ways To Recover From A Rotator Cuff Injury

When you have a rotator cuff injury, it can seriously impact your quality of life. Even the simplest things like changing your shirt are going to cause a lot of pain and be unbearable.

You have two options when you tear a rotator cuff. You can either do therapy to try to let it heal itself or you can have surgery. Either option is going to be painful for a while and require some therapy.

One thing’s for sure, though. If you don’t take care of the injury and rehab it, you are going to have problems for a long time to come. Even if you go the therapy route.

In this article, we will go over the steps you can take to get back to normal as if the injury never happened.

How To Deal With Your Rotator Cuff Injury

Here are a few straightforward tips to help you speed up your recovery process if you’ve suffered a rotator cuff injury:

1. Exercises To Heal It

After your injury, you’re going to have to regain a lot of the strength that you’ve lost.

Not only that, but your range of motion is severely diminished so you’ll need to heal it to the point that you can move freely and without pain.

If you can’t raise your hand above your head then your range of motion is not quite there yet.

There are some exercises and even equipment that you can use to bring your rotator cuff back to normal naturally.

Using workout machines is a good idea so that you’re sure that your motions are precise so you don’t end up making your injury worse.

Stretch The Rotator Cuff

Stretching is one of the best ways to rehab your rotator cuff injury as it won’t put any strain on you.

Take a look at Remington Medical’s Physiotherapy Equipment as they have the types of straps that you should be looking at to use for the proper stretching technique.

For instance, a very effective exercise is to use a stretchy band with a loop on one end that can attach to something like a doorknob.

1. Start by pulling the band tight with your elbow at 90°.
2. Pull your elbow in gently and slowly and then repeat.

You’ll feel the stretching of the rotator cuff, but it shouldn’t feel painful.

Pendulum Exercise

Another gentle exercise to recover from your rotator cuff injury is called pendulum:

1. With one hand on the back of a chair, lean forward and let the affected arm hang down.
2. Then gently sway it back and forth.
3. Stand up straight again and switch arms and repeat.

2. Change Your Sleeping Position

Many injuries make it difficult to sleep because of the pain. And a rotator cuff is no different. You’ll need to find the right position to sleep and try to stay that way through the night.

Try to lay on your uninjured side and stretch your injured arm away from you and propped up on a pillow. A large pregnancy pillow is usually good for these types of injuries.

3. Take Some Supplements

Strengthening your ligaments can be done by taking the right supplements. Things like St John’s Wort will have an effect on your injury by strengthening the musculoskeletal area where the injury occurred.

To get rid of inflammation, take some supplements that have zinc as the primary ingredient. Pain is usually caused by inflammation in the area where an injury took place so reducing it will reduce the pain along with it.

Now, if you’ve suffered a rotator cuff injury, you need your doctor’s advice on this. The above tips indeed will help you recover from the injury faster, but this does not mean you can skip your doctor’s visits.

Hopefully, these simple tips will help you better deal with your torn rotator cuff.