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Frozen Shoulder or Adhesive Capsulitis

The causes of frozen shoulder

Recent injury
Many cases of frozen shoulder seem to follow after an injury to the rotator cuff muscles or the shoulder joint. This injury can be major or may seem very minor at the time - only for frozen shoulder to develop later

Problems in other nearby joints
Frozen shoulder can develop in association with arthritis in the AC joint or the neck

Immobility
Conditions that lead to the limb being immobile have been shown to lead to frozen shoulder. These include stroke or CVA, immobilizing in a sling, brain or spinal injury

Heart or lung problems
Heart disease or cardiac surgery have sometimes led to frozen shoulder - as have major lung problems like TB or tumour

Diabetes Mellitus
Diabetics are much more likely to get frozen shoulder than the rest of the population - this is discussed in the next chapter

Other ailments
Thyroid problems, high cholesterol, parkinsons disease

The above list gives the commonest known "causes" of a frozen shoulder.

I put "causes" in inverted commas because in truth it is better to say that these are "associated conditions" rather than true causes. No one yet fully understands the trigger in the body that leads to a frozen shoulder but the items on the list above seem to be closely linked to the problem.

You should note however that the commonest cases have none of these associated features and just simply seem to arise from nowhere - these are called idiopathic cases.

Idiopathic is a medical word that means "cause unknown." This group of patients are by far the most common amongst those suffering with frozen shoulder.

I think it's also true that many people who "remember" a trigger incident or injury, can only do so with the benefit of hindsight. Some research doctor's believe that the problem was already brewing up in many of these people. They think that the minor injury was actually unrelated to the cause of the problem and only served to unmask the frozen shoulder by drawing the sufferers attention to the shoulder joint.

It might even be true that a joint already beginning to struggle with frozen shoulder changes is more likely to suffer a minor injury than a normal joint. So ... which came first - the chicken or the egg?

The facts about idiopathic frozen shoulder

Here's what research has shown us about the idiopathic variety of frozen shoulder:

• it happens mostly to people aged in their 50's, 60's and 70's
  
• women get it much more commonly than men (in my patients it's about four women to one man)
  
• there's no obvious connection to right or left-handedness
  
• it can sometimes affect both shoulders at once - or one after the other
  

It's a little difficult to get an idea of how common frozen shoulder truly is. The research studies that have tried to answer this question have not been very successful. Part of this relates to the fact that not all family doctors are skilled at making the diagnosis. You may already have experienced this in your own case.

We know some details about shoulder pain in general but not specifically about frozen shoulder.

In the "real world" up to a quarter of us experience some kind of shoulder pain every year. Only about one in twenty of those who experience such pain will attend their family doctor - and about one in ten of those might eventually be seen by a specialist. Now - research is done almost exclusively by specialists. Can you see where the problem is? The research is being conducted on a very selected group of patients - a group whose problems are likely to be quite different from the majority of shoulder pain sufferers.

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Also on this site:

What is frozen shoulder?
Who gets frozen shoulder pain?
Diabetics and frozen shoulder pain
Diagnosing frozen shoulder
Frozen Shoulder Investigations
Tips for living with shoulder pain and frozen shoulder
Treating frozen shoulder
Frozen shoulder injection
Frozen shoulder therapy
Acupuncture for frozen shoulder
Frozen shoulder surgery
Alternative treatments for frozen shoulder
Frozen shoulder medication
Recovery from frozen shoulder

If you would like to read more about the topic above then take a look at the book that Dr Cameron has written. It's called

How To Live With the Pain of a Frozen Shoulder

and it can be downloaded in electronic form, read on your computer screen or printed out to paper.

Click below to download a free copy of Dr Cameron's
Frozen Shoulder Book

Index of Painful Shoulder Conditions