Your labrum is a ring of cartilage that surrounds your shoulder socket that provides stability to the ball and socket joint. If this cartilage ring becomes damaged or torn, shoulder movement can not only become difficult, it can also become quite painful. For patients with minor to moderate labral damage, physical therapy is almost always the first choice of treatment. In today’s blog, we take a closer look at the five stages of physical therapy recovery for labral tears.
The 5 Stages Of PT For Labral Tears
Labral tears are a very common type of shoulder injury, especially as you get older as a result of some natural cartilage breakdown that occurs due to decades of normal physical strain. A labral tear can then become more likely during activities that put extra stress on your shoulder joint, like athletics that involve overhead arm actions or swimming motions, or as a result of trauma to the area like you might experience during a fall where you try to brace yourself for impact with your arms.
If you believe you’ve suffered a labral tear, you can save yourself some time and money by heading right to a physical therapist’s office. You’ll likely be referred to a PT clinic anyways, and since you don’t need a referral in order to seek physical therapy, you can begin your rehab sooner by connecting with a physical therapy team right away. Oftentimes labral tears are treated through five distinct stages of physical therapy. Here’s a closer look at each stage:
- Pain And Symptom Management – The first stage of recovery will focus on reducing pain and managing the symptoms you’re experiencing as a result of your labral tear. Gentle hands-on manipulation can help restore some movement in the shoulder, and your PT will work to educate you on some of the movements to avoid during the early stages of recovery. They’ll also explain how to use ice and heat to your advantage to calm symptoms or bring healthy blood to the area.
- Regaining Range Of Motion – Next, your physical therapist will begin working to help you establish more range of motion in the shoulder. They have you gradually begin some gentle shoulder movement exercises that will begin to reestablish comfortable movement in the area. Controlled exercise can also help to boost blood flow to the area, bringing oxygenated blood to the recovering labral tissue.
- Motor Control – As range of motion improves, your physical therapist will progress to work on motor control in the shoulder joint. More exercises will be added to your routine that will target the muscles around the shoulder, like your deltoids, rotator cuff muscles and scapular stabilizers. These exercises will improve your overall shoulder stability, take some stress off the labrum and help with shoulder coordination and proprioception.
- Targeted Strengthening – The next stage will simply involve taking on more challenging exercises that help to develop even more strength in the shoulder and surrounding structures. Targeted exercises help ensure muscles develop evenly so that a muscular imbalance doesn’t leave you at risk for injury. These exercises will help you get back to doing everyday activities comfortably once again.
- Return To Sporting Activities – Finally, the physical therapist will design some exercises and home-based activities to help you get back to athletic movements and more strenuous shoulder actions. We want you to be able to perform overhead motions or swing your arms during athletics, and that is done by gradually increasing the intensity and volume of your physical therapy exercises. Once you’ve made a strong enough recovery, we will clear you for the athletic activities that you love most.
Most patients can progress through these stages in 4-8 weeks depending on the severity of their labral tear, but it could take a bit longer depending on your specific injury and your return to sport goals. For more information about labral tears or physical therapy for other injuries, reach out to the team at OrthoRehab Specialists today at (612) 339-2041.