Adam Rufa - 5/26/2006

Question
Hello, Adam...
My injury happened over a year ago.  I am female. One day, I was working out and I believe I tore or injured something in my left back area on the rear delt machine.  There was not a defining moment or anything like that.

What happened was that the weight was a little too heavy and I was too lazy to get up and change the pin, thinking I could handle it.  After that this area began to hurt, especially when using the muscles involved.

The fact that it hasn't healed in over a year tells me something is torn.  I haven't sought medical attention because it really doesn't bother me unless I work out and use those muscles so I've been avoiding those particular machines.

If you would take your right hand and stretch it across your chest and under your left armpit onto your back as far as you can reach, that's where it's at.  I looked on a muscle diagram and it looks like teres major or infraspinatus muscle.

I see my MD for a physical soon and was wondering what test(s) would show an injury on this soft tissue?  Can muscle tear and not knit back together on its own?  Are their tendons in that area? Any other advice or info would be appreciated.

Thanks so much.

Answer
Carol,

Just because the pain has been present for 1 year it does not mean that your muscle is torn. Pain in this area is often referred and the location of the pain is not always indicative of the location of the problem. Some common causes of pain in this area are:

        1)Neck problems
        2) rib dysfunction
        3)Rotator cuff tenodonopathy
        4)Muscle trigger points
The best test for looking at soft tissue is an MRI, however they are not perfect.

My suggestion would be to see a good manual physical therapist for some treatment. If you don't get any improvement over 3-4 weeks of treatment then get some tests.

Adam