Playing football can lead to a variety of shoulder injuries, both major and minor. Every play can cause injury in dozens of ways. Strength coaches spend entire off-seasons preparing players' bodies for the rigors of a football season, and athletic trainers and doctors spend long hours before and after practices and games diagnosing and treating injuries to the shoulder.
Types of Injuries
Shoulder pain and injury varies greatly during football season. Contusions can be sustained on contact with other players or the ground. When these collisions are at high speeds, the shoulder joint can be structurally damaged via dislocations or separations. The muscles of the shoulder can be strained and torn due to unnatural stretching that can occur when the shoulder is put in awkward positions, and even the nerves in the shoulder can be pinched or stimulated due to awkward contact.
Treatment
All treatment regimes begin with ice. Pain in the shoulder can be concentrated to a particular location, as in joint or muscle injuries, or can encompass the entire shoulder regions, as in nerve damage. Once the swelling has subsided, you can begin light rehabilitation exercises, including flexibility and strengthening. Athletic programs with advanced treatment facilities may have electronic stimulation machines that combine ice with electronic stimulus to speed up the healing in the muscles. Joint injuries require extensive stretching, while nerve injuries benefit from strengthening exercises.
Prevention
The most effective way to handle shoulder pain from football is to prevent it by strengthening the muscles that hold the joint together. The shoulder joint is a weak joint and is only held together by the muscles surrounding it. Dislocations and separations can be prevented by devoting extra time in the off-season and in-season workout programs to strengthening the shoulder muscles. Flexibility in the shoulder is vital to football players because of the awkward positions your body is in throughout practices and games. Large, bulky muscles must be stretched even more often to maintain flexibility. Unfortunately, nerve injuries such as stingers cannot be prevented by strengthening the muscles. To avoid these injuries, you must focus on proper contact technique.
Causes of Injuries
As a defensive end rushing the quarterback, little thought goes through your head other than how to beat the blocker in front of you. The rip is a quick pass rush move that uses speed but can place your arm in position to be pulled behind your body violently, pulling and tearing muscle. Quarterbacks are slammed to the ground each game by larger, faster athletes. These collisions are intensified by being sandwiched between these athletes and the ground, which causes contusions and separations to the joint. Linebackers must step into open holes and take on fullbacks who often outweigh them and have significant momentum behind them. If the neck and shoulder are hit at the wrong angle, the entire side of the body can go numb from the resulting stinger.
References
- "Complete Conditioning for Football"; Michael Arthur, Bryan Bailey, Tom Osborne; 1998
- "Healthy Shoulder Handbook"; Karl Knopf; 2010
