Rotator cuff tears are a common baseball injury, especially for pitchers. Your rotator cuff keeps your arm in its socket. It’s made up of a group of four muscles that combine as a tendon to help rotate and move your arm. This is why pitchers often fall victim to this injury.
TWO TYPES OF TEARS:
- Partial
- Full-Thickness
A tear happens when one or more of your tendons tears and becomes either fully or partially detached from the upper arm bone, called the humerus. The injury usually starts with tendon frays and takes an expeditious movement, like a fastball pitch, to result in an actual tear. While supraspinatus tears are the most common, other parts of your rotator cuff may be involved.
The Ball Player’s Companion: Prevention of Rotator Cuff Tears
- Use proper technique. Our therapists & athletic trainer’s can teach you the proper shoulder & overall body mechanics.
- Practice regularly to improve your technique and prevent injury.
- Exercise all the muscle groups in your shoulder. It’s important to train not just any one rotator cuff muscle, but its antagonist (the muscle that performs the opposite motion).
- Strengthening exercises that emphasize equal conditioning of both muscle groups will help prevent the humeral head slipping out of the socket,
- Reduces the risk of rotator cuff tears in baseball players’ throwing arms.
- Listen to your body.
- If your shoulder is sore, weak, or fatigued, take some time to rest it. A few days of lost training is worth it if it prevents a serious shoulder injury.
Haylee Marsteller MS, LAT, ATC
By completing your full course of therapy for shoulder pain, we can help you return to pain-free activities and prevent future injuries! Give us a call today at 703-450-4300 to schedule your initial evaluation.
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