Most of my patients that come in with these issues don’t realize that some of these things are related. That pesky shoulder pain that bothers you when you reach for your phone in the morning, or just hurts when you lay on that side could actually be due to an old disc injury you’ve forgotten about. It’s pretty common and many times when the shoulder or arm is bothersome then the neck is usually not feeling any pain but may feel slight stiffness.
It’s similar to that “sciatic pain” people always complain about. They usually feel the leg pain when the low back is feeling fine and as the leg pain goes away the back suddenly starts to feel tight and painful before it goes away.
The same thing can happen in our neck and shoulders from the disc irritating a nearby nerve and causing inflammation. These nerves feed into our arms to control the muscles and sensations. Typically after we start treating the area, the shoulder or arm pain goes away but they will feel increased pain in the neck as the treatment progresses and then they both “magically” go away.
Here’s a picture to show the typical pain pattern for someone having shoulder or arm pain that comes from their neck.
So how do you figure out if the shoulder pain you’re having is related to the neck pain?
