Prolotherapy and Shoulder Injuries


Shoulder Dislocation
Shoulder dislocation occurs when an athlete falls on an outstretched hand or when an anterior force to the shoulder occurs when the shoulder is abducted and externally rotated. This is the position of the shoulder when, for example, a person is waving to someone. Very few people dislocate their shoulder for the first time without having a significant force or injury.

Shoulder Injury
Shoulder Injuries and pain are quite common in golfers, swimmers, and tennis players. Shoulder pain may be due to acute bursitis, also known as an inflammation of the gel-like cushion in the shoulder. This results in extreme pain in the upper arm and shoulder region. Pain may even extend down the arm and can be quite severe. These patients find it almost impossible to lie on the shoulder. 

Rotator Cuff and Prolotherapy
The most common cause of chronic shoulder complaints in the athlete is rotator cuff tendonitis, specifically weakness of the supraspinatous tendon. In pitching, the arm is repeatedly abducted and externally rotated and this puts a strain on the rotator cuff, resulting in frequent tears or injuries.

Shoulder Injury, Dead Arm Syndrome, Rotator Cuff
A natural consequence of weakened or injured shoulder ligaments is chronic shoulder instability. This situation may occur as a result of previous Shoulder Dislocations, but may also occur due to congenitally loose joints or from repetitive motion injury as in pitching. Repetitive microtrauma, occurring as a direct result of these injuries, begins to take its toll on the supporting structures of the shoulder and disrupts the delicate balance between mobility and stability. Subtle signs of joint instability and laxity become evident, including pain with abduction and external rotation (called a Positive Apprehension Test), tenderness to palpation throughout the shoulder joint, and the subjective feeling of weakness in the arm (Dead Arm Syndrome).

Prolotherapy and Elbow Injuries


Elbow Ligament Injury
Any sport that puts significant force on the elbow has the potential to cause injury. The most common sport to injure the lateral collateral ligament (radial collateral ligament) is tennis. Any throwing motion whether it be the javelin, shot put, football or baseball put tremendous forces on the inside or medial aspect of the elbow. This is sometimes misdiagnosed as "golfer's elbow" which is injury to the muscle attachments of the wrist flexor muscles.

Prolotherapy to the area causes a mild healing inflammatory reaction. This eventually causes the ligament to thicken and strengthen. For pitchers, it means no more pain with throwing. It is common for pitchers to note a bump of 5 10 mph on their fast ball.

Prolotherapy and Back Injuries

Degenerative Disc Disease and the Athlete
Degenerative disc disease (DDD). This is a common form of Osteoarthritis in the back. A degenerated disc is one that has lost some water and as a result loses height and flattens. In athletes, DDD can be seen even at a very early age (late teens or early 20s) as a result of sports injuries that never healed. When, at a young age, an athlete permanently overstretches the ligaments of the low back, the lumbar spine becomes unstable, and excessive movement occurs at that segment of the spine. This results in excessive stress being exerted on the disc. The disc cannot sustain the excessive pressures and, gradually, fissures and tears develop in the outer layer of the disc. The process of degenerative disc disease is thus accelerated, especially if the athlete continues to play. Eventually many or all of the lumbar discs become degenerated. Degeneration of a disc begins as soon as the lumbar ligaments become loose.

DISC PROBLEMS IN Sports Injuries

Nearly 95 percent of all the low back pain occurs in a six by four inch area. This is the place where the fifth lumbar vertebra connects with the base of the sacrum and they both connect to the pelvis by various ligaments.
 

Specifically, the lumbar vertebrae connect to the sacrum by the lumbosacral ligaments, the sacrum to the iliac crests by the sacroiliac ligaments, and the lumbar vertebrae to the iliac crests by the iliolumbar ligaments. This is the most common area in the back treated by Prolotherapy.

Prolotherapy and Ligament Injury


The Side Effects of Icing a Ligament Injury
In one landmark study done at the University of Hawaii, Dr. Sherwin Ho and associates, put a commercially-available ice wrap on one knee for 20 minutes, and on the opposite knee a wrap was placed at room temperature. The knees were then injected with dye and scanned for blood flow. The study showed that all iced knees demonstrated a decrease in arterial and soft tissue blood flow, as well as decreased bone uptake of the dye, which is a reflection of changes in both the bone blood flow and metabolic rate.

The Seven No's of Ligament Injury
Ligaments have essentially no blood vessels of their own to bring them nutrients. Their nutrition must come from diffusion of nutrients, most likely from the joint itself. This should make it evident to you why ligaments are so easily injured. A joint is impacted during an athletic event. The small blood vessels to the joint are sheared. The little blood supply that the ligaments had is then cut off. The immune system reacting to the damaged caused to the joint wants to repair the damage, but can not do so if no immune cells can get to the area because of the poor or interrupted blood supply.

Knee Injury and Prolotherapy
 

ACL, MCL, PCL
We have had plenty of occasions where the MRI - (Knee Research Study) showed extensive knee damage and Prolotherapy completely relieved the pain. Obviously, the more extensive injuries in and around the knee require more Prolotherapy injections per visit, and often an increased number of visits.

Of course, surgery is repeatedly recommended for torn cruciate ligaments. For anything except complete rupture (grade 3 injury) of the anterior cruciate ligament, avoid surgery if possible. The fact that there are so many ways to perform the surgery is an indication that there is no one excellent method.

PROLOTHERAPY & The Patella (Knee Cap)
When there is a problem with this part of the knee it manifests as pain in the front of the knee after strong exertion (running, skiing, or stair climbing.) This may be due to erosion of the cartilage on the under side of the patella, poor tracking of the patella in its groove on the front of the knee, or an inflamed tendons on the lower edge of the patella.