Rehabbing old guy traumatic shoulder injury

[tweakxc03]

Hey Rip -

My Dad is 67yrs old, 6'2, 200lbs or so.

14 months ago he was in his den and tripped over a rug and went head first through a plate glass window. A glass shard gashed into his neck and just barely missed his carotid. The impact to his head into the glass knocked him out cold. He's a very lucky SOB to be alive right now. They stitched up his neck and that's it.

Ever since then he has had this visibly large knot in his trap and he cant lift his arm laterally past like 45 degrees. Since then he has had ongoing shoulder pain running from his neck down through his trap, rotator cuff, felt. One of his docs mentioned something called Frozen Shoulder... I have no idea what that is or if it's a real thing.

I imagine he fucked up his shoulder in the fall to the floor.

So, here are my questions -
1. Does he need an MRI? I assume almost certainly yes.

2. What barbell exercises, if any, can I start him out on in the meantime, if any? He has zero strength training experience

What else do you recommend?

[Mark Rippetoe]

He fucked up his NECK during the fall. As yes, he needs a cervical MRI study.

[tweakxc03]

Thanks Rip -

Is there anything he can do in the mean time while we wait for the MRI? I was thinking about maybe starting him out with just some box squats with a safety bar or something like that, but I don't know if he can have anything on his shoulders.

[Mark Rippetoe]

If it was my neck, I'd rather know what's wrong before I believed my son.