A Personal Trainers Tip for Shoulder Pain

Shoulder injuries are some of the most common complaints that a personal trainer will come accross - affecting millions of people around the world. I see people every day who say "my shoulders don't feel right, or I get shoulder pain when trying to do this or that." If you have chronic shoulder pain, you should seek medical help to diagnose the problem and treat it. What I am going to talk about today is how to prevent shoulder injuries and pain. In fact, I can't diagnose your injury without examining your shoulder. That's what our Inpower Assessment help identify. Personal Trainers should have some sort of assessment format in place when ever they see a new client. It could be a simple range of motion screen or even posture screen. That is all up to the personal trainers level of knowledge but any test that can help identify weaknesses and limitations will greatly improve the program delivery and overall results seen from a client. The best thing is to prevent a shoulder injury and subsequent pain before you think about getting a diagnosis report. So, what can you do to prevent shoulder injuries?

A Personal Trainer examines everything

Don't be surprised if your oral hygiene plays a crucial role in preventing shoulder pain. What type of bacteria do you have in your mouth? There is growing evidence in the 1990's that some form of bacteria is linked to osteoarthritis. The link is now clear and indicates that specific types of bacteria can damage the cartilage in your shoulder blade. In fact, today, there is a test called "Oral DNA" where the patient swishes a solution inside the mouth, and the healthcare provider will tell you exactly what type of bacteria is in your mouth. A good medical practitioner can recommend the best treatment for this bacteria - whether it is oregano oil or lactobacillus rhamnosus.

In fact, poor oral hygiene is considered a cartilage killer. Steve Reeves revealed - some fifty years ago - that the health of the teeth was one of the best predictors of the strength of a bodybuilder. Further research on the subject matter is going on at the moment. If you are a personal Trainer, you shouldn't be overlooking these standards

Check your Food intolerences

Another reason for joint injuries is food intolerance. If you have an unsuspecting food intolerance, it could eventually destroy your joint health. I have seen cases where people ate wheat and milk for years, and it destroyed thier joints. Once I suggested to eliminate these foods from their diet, their joint health improved. For example, if you have some tendons that are regularily inflamed like tricep tendons try elimianting wheat and dairy. Within 5 days of stopping milk foods and toast for breakfast and replacing them with with eggs and steak, your tendons will stop flaring up. In fact, there are chemical causes for joint injuries due to food intolerances. The latest research shows that certain foods attack your connective tissues and in your case, the same food can attack the thyroid. What we know from such research is food intolerance does specific damage in different individuals.

Try Adding Exercises for the stabiliser's

The third cause of shoulder injury is something that you could easily prevent. The solution is to do more Trap-3 and external rotations. Pulley and knee external rotations are easy to do since you only need to change the orientation of your hand and leg to get a completely new stimulus. On the other hand, Cuban presses and 2-arm incline dumbbell trap-3s come in a number of variations to cycle through without any repetition for well over a year.

The fourth cause of shoulder injury is the overuse of the subscapularis by pressing them the same way. You should change the pressing exercise every 5-6 workouts. For example, you perform a 10-degree decline press and a 15 degree press by performing the grip narrow or a little bit wider. You can also perform dips . In fact, I used to have a number of clients with bad shoulder issues. As I decided to vary the pressing exercises, their pain went away. I was also following rule #3 and giving the clients external rotator, trap-3, and some scapular retractor exercises. But just changing the pressing reduced their shoulder pain. On the other hand, increasing the pressing variability helped reduce shoulder injuries in the process.

Try Eliminating Bench press for 8 weeks

The fifth major cause of shoulder pain is pressing too often between flat and 45 degrees. I will go 8 weeks sometimes in clients programs with no bench press in order to improve their bench press. Thats right,  you can improve your bench press by not bench pressing. I will concrentrate on increasing the overhead press for four months of the year - assuming you could train year-round. But with some athletes for example who could train only for 12-18 weeks, I wouldn't do any bench presses for the first 9 weeks.

Variation is Key

Varying the press exercises is important. I would say that if you haven't lifted any weights for at least 36 months, you should do one workout out of two with dumbbells. They should perform with a neutral grip instead of a pronated grip. If you decide to press pronated, you're bound to get injured. When you are using heavy dumbbells, you will be shortening the range of motion when the plates touch your chest. That way you will never have a full range of motion. If you want to build healthy shoulders, you should always press in a neutral grip position with dumbbells.

In Summary

. One - Get your teeth clean, check out for bacteria, and kill the bacteria.

. Two - Get the food intolerance test done. If you are intolerant, cut the bad stuff out of your diet.

. Three - Make sure to train the trap-3, external rotators, and the scapular retractors.

. Four - Vary your presses, and don't perform the same press for more than 6 workouts in a row - I prefer to leave it at 4.

. Five - Ensure you work on your overhead strength at least one-third of your workout time.

I hope this Article is useful for personal trainers who have clients with shoulder injuries.