How to stop pain beneath shoulder blade
Experiencing pain below your scapular (the blade of your shoulder) can be extremely frustrating. This area is difficult to massage and pain here can vey easily become chronic.
At our movement and chronic pain facility in Brisbane, pain under the shoulder blade is common. We are experts at proving people with long-term relief instead of simply massaging the problem away for a day or two.
Let's look at some client reviews, and then explore how to relieve shoulder blade pain longterm.
“I have been working with Max at Functional Patterns Brisbane twice a week for approx 6 month. Before Functional patterns I had back and shoulder pain and would regularly see chiropractors to help manage the pain.
In my time training with Max I haven’t been back to the Chiropractor once. Max is exceptionally patient. He is great at explaining the benefits of each movement and how with these actions are undoing years of substandard movements.”
“After 3.5 years of chronic shoulder pain, pre and post surgery. I am now pain free and able to to do multiple reps, not just 2! 3.5 years of rehab does not compare to 4 months with fp!
...I now walk and live my life more functionally, with intention and no more aches and pains!”
How To Stop Pain in the Back Underneath the Shoulder Blade
If you're looking for a shoulder blade pain remedy, you have likely come across a few options. Let's quickly explore common home remedies and assess their pros and cons.
The following list comes from Injury Map
1. Exercise
The article says that exercise is the preferred treatment for most chronic pain. It mentions that exercise builds the strength to support the injured area. This is completely true in the correct context.
They then say that stretch exercises help relieve tension in the muscles. This is also somewhat true in the correct context. Unfortunately, people often perform both exercise and stretching in a way that does more harm than good.
The paragraph finishes by saying that you should go slow and stop if exercise makes the pain worse.
Lets break this down and pull out a few main points!
Few people experience long-term chronic pain relief from exercise. People contact our centre daily to tell us about the poor results they have gotten from exercise rehab. Why is this the case?
As Injury Map mentioned, exercise builds supportive strength around injured areas. What does this mean?
I general context, it means that their is often weakness present with chronic pain. We can use exercise to strengthen that weakness.
Now, here is the issue we encounter.
How do we identify what is truly weak on a meaningful level? What if multiple areas around the body are weak? How do we access the weak areas when the body is hell-bent on compensating with the strong areas?
These are the questions that most exercise rehab coaches or specialists fail to ask or answer.
If you have a shoulder injury, they may check the strength of your arm by having you push down. They may then deduce that your arm is weak and then they will strengthen it using cookie-cutter exercises.
HOW DO WE ADDRESS WEAKNESS Holistically?
We assess the entire body by analysing the clients gait cycle. This means looking at the way they stand, walk and run. This allows us to see bigger and more meaningful issues.
A simple arm strength test cannot determine that weakness in your left glute is causing the ache below your shoulder blade. This is just an example.
To add to this, a basic strength test will not tell you how to address the weakness. Training to improve and balance your gait cycle is the best way to reduce all of your chronic pain at once.
What Else Do They Recommend For Sore Shoulder Blades?
2. Try out cold or heat therapy
Injury map says that ice is a quick way to relieve pain. It also says to try a heat pack. This is obviously unlikely to fix your pain. This, along with the next piece of advice, is a bandaid.
3. Take over-the-counter pain relievers
The article then recommends trying pain killers. Sadly, the lack of long term options leaves many people taking regular pain killers.
NSAIDs, such as ibuprofen and aspirin, are commonly used for pain and inflammation, but long-term use can also pose risks. They can also cause various medical conditions.
NSAIDS (aspirin, ibuprofen, Nurofen, naproxen, Voltaren, Celebrex)
GI (gut) Problems
Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD)
Kidney Damage
Heart conditions/risk of heart attack
Hypertension
Liver Damage
Acetaminophen (Paracetamol/Panadol)
Liver Damage
Kidney Damage
4. Give yourself a massage
Finally, according to Injury Map, you may need to massage yourself or schedule a massage.
They say a foam roller or massage ball is your best bet. This is actually great advice!
However, most specialists or internet blogs will tell you the wrong technique. Injury Map says to "roll the foam roller or ball under your shoulder blade until you find a tender spot."
Try this, but the best spots for shoulder blade pain are surprisingly down the front of your body. Your pecs and quads may provide much faster and longer lasting relief. This is because tight pecs and quads pull your shoulders forward and cause a persistent stretch under your shoulder blades.
Few people know that an overly-stretched upper back causes most back pain under the shoulder blade. Just because something hurts, it does not mean it is tight. In fact, most chronic pain comes from overly stretched muscles and weakness.
A Summary of The Best Ways To Stop Pain Underneath the Shoulder Blade
Focus on Your Gait Cycle
A gait assessment is the best assessment for identifying the deeper cause of chronic pain. If you want to know you best treatment options, you need to analyse your gait. Muscle pain underneath the shoulder blade is almost always a result of improper gait cycle and posture.
If you suffer from pain below the left shoulder blade, are you curious as to how the rest of your body is contributing? Pain under the left shoulder blade is common when people don't have a good balance of flexing and extending during movement.
If you are not getting any extension through your thoracic spine, you will not strengthen these muscles. This weakness can lead to a compensation from the front of your body. This is why we often see poor posture alongside underneath shoulder blade pain.
Gait also forces you to connect your glutes, core and entire body to the best of your ability. This allows us to see where the weak points are in your chains. A chain is a group of muscles that work together to perform movement.
For example, most people lack connection in the glutes and core. This puts excessive pressure on areas like the upper and lower back.
So, if you have pain in the back under the shoulder blade, the first step is to find out why. And no, it is not simply because you are too tight or weak in that area. Look around to see how your body is integrating and solve that.
Train Your Gait Cycle
Now that you have a clear and holistic view of what is wrong, it is time to fix it. Once you know that your gait is not perfect, you have things you can work on that will directly improve your pain.
For example, if your back line (the muscles on the back of your body) are weak, you can now address that. No, that does not mean doing deadlifts. Most common exercises fail to improve the gait cycle and therefore fail to improve pain levels.
Functional Patterns is a training method that showcases countless results of success with sudden chronic shoulder pain. The method does this by assessing gait and then directly training it. The method is incredible at achieving measurable success with their clients.
Try Myo Fascial Release (MFR)
In the meantime, swap your pain medication and costly massages for MFR. This technique is extremely helpful for pain relief (when done correctly).
Take a small, hard ball (A lacrosse ball and a softball work best for their hardness and size).
Place the ball on the area, over a muscle. Do not place directly on bone. You should feel a band of tissue under the ball.
Slowly move hr ball around until you find an area that is uncomfortable. The pain should not be a shooting pain, it should be dull and uncomfortable. It can feel quite severe but you need to be able to stay calm. If you feel yourself becoming agitated, back off the pressure.
The best spots to target for right pain under the shoulder blade are:
Right pec
Right and left diaphragm/upper abs (never put a ball or roller in the middle of your sternum or on your ribs)
Left adductor
Left Quad
Tightness in a chain of muscles on the front of your body is often the cause of back pain under right shoulder blade. Weakness or lack of connection in the back of your body often leads to this tightness.
Weakness in the back of your body causes this tightness. Therefore it is a good idea to do an exercise that targets your entire back after this release. Creating a more connected back chain will prevent tightness in the front more permanently. Functional Patterns has some great exercise options for this.
The Best spots for pain underneath left shoulder blade are generally:
Left pec
Right and left diaphragm/upper abs (never put a ball or roller in the middle of your sternum or on your ribs)
Right adductor
Right Quad
This is generic advice. Analysing your gait is the only way to truly know where the ball should go. Another great way to tell is by the results.
The fantastic thing about MFR is that it is fairly instant. If you release the correct muscles, you should gain some instant relief and it should feel easier to move about.
Any pain in the shoulder blade when breathing should dissipate after a correct release. As mentioned earlier, this relief will only stay if you address the reason for the tightness in the first place. Assess your gait and work on those sloppy connections.