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Upper Extremity

Shoulder

1) Too many people advance too quickly with pull up progressions.  Too few spend enough time mastering the hang.  Dan Pope writes a nice concise post with 3 basic hang exercises for the shoulders.  And he backs it up with some solid biomechanical logic.

2) Eric Cressey gives a nice 3 minute breakdown of proper cueing for the scaption exercise.  I think a tactile cue for posterior tilting the scapula is one of the best rehab interventions out there.  

3) Heart disease and rotator cuff symptoms are linked in a new study. Maybe it has to do with circulation? Or maybe the rotator cuff symptoms are just the output of a lifestyle dysfunction?

4) Erson shares a nice example of a motor control shoulder dysfunction.  Before you jump to conclusions, assess their movement impairment with different patterns (i.e. posture changes, sequencing, distal positioning, centration, etc.).

5) When all else fails…try sticking a needle in their trigger points.  In this study, they found dry needling the teres minor and infraspinatus resolved a patient’s shoulder symptom.  “This case report described the examination and use of dry needling in a case where the diagnosis was unclear. Clinicians may consider trigger point referral when examining patients with reports of abnormal sensation, especially when a more common cause cannot be identified.”

(source)

Elbow

6) Proximal stability…again, “In closing, the study demonstrated that the group of players with a torn UCL showed a great decrease in strength on the throwing and non-throwing arm in both ER and IR when compared to the healthy control group”

7) This elbow scratch collapse test for ulnar neuropathy is interesting.  It’s like NKT, but with nerves.  Reminds me of the importance of using MMT as an assessment of the system after interventions.  “The scratch collapse test had significantly higher sensitivity than Tinel’s test and the flexion/nerve compression test for carpal tunnel and cubital tunnel syndromes. Accuracy for this test was 82% for carpal tunnel syndrome and 89% for cubital tunnel syndrome. This novel test provides a useful addition to existing clinical maneuvers in the diagnosis of these common nerve compression syndromes.”

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