Chronic pain during shoulder movement… Suspected ‘slab lesion’ torn cartilage [건강 올레길] : Sports Donga

Although the shoulder joint has a wide range of motion, it is relatively unstable compared to other joints. Because of this, you can easily get injured just by strongly stretching or bending your arm. This is especially the case for sports such as tennis or badminton using racquets or shoulder exercises at the gym.

Among them, if you feel chronic pain in your shoulder, you need to suspect a slap lesion. This refers to damage to the inside of the joint attached to the long head of the biceps tendon (biceps muscle) when there is chronic damage to the joint or when a strong force is applied.

The tendon above the shoulder joint and the labrum connected to it are damaged mainly due to excessive rotation of the shoulder joint, trauma, dislocation, etc., and it progresses to a slab lesion. Therefore, special attention is required for those who use their shoulders a lot or who engage in vigorous sports activities.

The main symptom is a rattling feeling and pain in the shoulder when lifting or leaning back. In severe cases, the pain may cause weakness in the arm. If left unattended, it can cause other shoulder diseases, so it is desirable to receive appropriate treatment.

Treatment is carried out after comprehensively determining the size of the rupture, bone dislocation, and surrounding ligaments and blood vessels through X-ray and MRI examinations. In the initial stage, conservative treatment such as drug treatment, injection treatment, and manual treatment is performed first.

Among them, slap suture to suture the upper labrum and biceps tendon transfer fixation, which transfers the biceps tendon attachment to the upper arm bone of the shoulder, are typical surgical methods. Above all, slap lesions are difficult to distinguish from other shoulder diseases, so if shoulder pain persists, you should visit a hospital and receive an accurate diagnosis from a specialist.

Daeha Kim, Director, SNU Seoul Hospital