Experience with Prolotherapy for muscle/tendon pain?

[dhalli]

I've got a cranky, knackered old shoulder. The joint is fine, no noticeable impingement... but significant rotator cuff and anterior deltoid pain that has persisted for... ahh... two decades.

I regularly do OHP, which has helped. I flat bench, and can do that fine as long as I'm well warmed up and my form is on point.
If I even look at an incline bench, or hear "lateral raise"... pain. It has woken me up at night, just by moving wrong.

Docs are all about either prescribing an addictive pain killer, doing surgery, or saying to piss off. With those choices, I prefer the later. I've had acupuncture recently, with some fair results, but Prolotherapy has been suggested a few times. I have a ND that does it, but I'd like to hear real world experiences by people that paid for it... not profited from it


Thanks!

[Taylor Grayson]

Have you explored trigger point release? I've had pain that lasted over a year that responded to this treatment with total elimination of the pain.

[dhalli]

Have you explored trigger point release? I've had pain that lasted over a year that responded to this treatment with total elimination of the pain.

I have a few times over the years, but with no success on the shoulder. A couple DRs said it's likely a tear. If it's persisted for 20 years, it's something

[A Schenck]

Docs are all about either prescribing an addictive pain killer, doing surgery, or saying to piss off.

Options A and C are the same thing as far a getting you healed... but option A is more expensive.

A couple DRs said it's likely a tear.

My entire experience with prolotheraphy is the Wikipedia article I just read.. but... it sounds like if it works it only works on conditions characterized by pain/inflammation (back pain, tendonitis, osteoarthritis). I don't see any claims or mechanisms by which a tear could be healed. Have you had any imaging of the joint to confirm your doctors suspicions about a tear?

[Taylor Grayson]

I have a few times over the years, but with no success on the shoulder. A couple DRs said it's likely a tear. If it's persisted for 20 years, it's something

Well, a trigger point IS something and they seem to persist if not treated.

[dhalli]

Options A and C are the same thing as far a getting you healed... but option A is more expensive.

My entire experience with prolotheraphy is the Wikipedia article I just read.. but... it sounds like if it works it only works on conditions characterized by pain/inflammation (back pain, tendonitis, osteoarthritis). I don't see any claims or mechanisms by which a tear could be healed. Have you had any imaging of the joint to confirm your doctors suspicions about a tear?

I couldn't see how prolotherapy would do anything for a tear, especially one that has been around for a long ass time. I have not had imaging, though I could ask for it. In fact, I'll shoot my Dr an email right now...

[dhalli]

Well, a trigger point IS something and they seem to persist if not treated.

I had something similar in my forearm for years... one "brutal" session of trigger point therapy, and it hasn't bothered me since.

I guess imaging is the next step, then see where to go from there.