Innovative Solution for Frozen Shoulder developed by Hyderabad surgeon

• Simple treatment in KIMS Kondapur facility

Hyderabad, 9th December 2020: High school headmaster Narsimulu (name changed), a 59-year-old diabetic, had been having sleepless nights due to relentless pain in his right shoulder since one year. The pain had started gradually without any apparent cause around December last year and had now aggravated enough to cause much difficulty in performing his day-to-day activities. In January 2020, he consulted a orthopaedic surgeon for the same. The orthopaedic surgeon concluded that Mr Narsimulu was suffering from diabetes associated frozen shoulder and advised him pain killers, thermotherapy and shoulder physiotherapy. Mr Narsimulu, however, did not get any relief with a course of physiotherapy. Because of that, he had significant difficulty in basic activities like having food, holding a newspaper, holding a piece of chalk to write on the blackboard to teach his students and severe pain even at night disturbing his whole night sleep. So he revisited his doctor, who administered steroid injection into the joint and advised him to continue the physiotherapy.

Adding to his woes, the Covid-19 lockdown in March 2020 forced Mr Nasimulu to stay indoors, as a result of which he could not continue the physiotherapy. He tried several online consultations with different orthopaedic surgeons but in vain. By the time when lockdown ended, he became completely dependent on his family even for the most basic activities of the day. The pain was unbearable. On the suggestion of a relative, he visited Dr Ajay Kumar Paruchuri in KIMS hospital, Kondapur, who advised him an MRI of the shoulder.

The MRI revealed that Mr Narsimulu had developed stage 3 of Adhesive Capsulitis (Frozen Shoulder). Dr Ajay suggested a novel and unique keyhole arthroscopic capsular release of the shoulder joint which is done as a daycare procedure.

Narsimulu underwent this procedure and got immediate relief. In his own words, Narsimulu described how he had almost given up hope of getting better and how he had become depressed until Dr Ajay provided a perfect solution for his long-standing problem.

Senior Consultant Arthroscopic Surgeon of the orthopaedic team at KIMS hospital kondapur, Dr Ajay Kumar Paruchuri explains that frozen shoulder is a very common condition, especially affecting elderly people and those with diabetes and during the winter months. According to him, the traditional methods of treatment like giving heat-packs, pain killers, steroid injections and physiotherapy might not work in certain cases.

Dr Ajay opines that in such relentless and recurrent cases of severe disability, a simple technique of inflating the shoulder joint by injecting saline into the shoulder joint capsule effectively releases the adhesions of the capsule without causing any damage to the surrounding structures and gives immediate relief to the patient.

Older methods of manipulation are usually associated with significant post-procedural pain, rotator cuff muscle tears or sometimes even in disastrous fractures. Hence, these crude procedures have been abandoned globally. In such condition, arthroscopic capsular releases have come as a boon for patients suffering from frozen shoulders. This procedure is safe, painless with almost negligible complication rate and has been gaining popularity worldwide. Mr Narsimulu is now back in his favourite classroom, happy and pain-free life.