Professional paper
Radial Extracorporeal Shock Wave Therapy in the Treatment of Shoulder Calcific Tendinitis
Viviana Avancini-Dobrović
Ljubinka Frlan-Vrgoč
Doris Stamenković
Ivan Pavlović
Tea Schnurrer-Luke Vrbanić
Abstract
Shoulder calcific lesions of the rotator cuff are a common problem in physiatric and orthopedic practice. The lesions
aremostly located in the supraspinatus tendon, close to the insertion area in the critical zone. Patients are usually treated
conservatively by nonsteroid antiinflammatory drugs, analgesic drugs, local injections, physiotherapy and rarely by applying
surgical procedures. Painful shoulder gives rise to functional disabilities and may sometimes lead to pharmacological
overuse. In the last twenty years, extracorporeal shock wave therapy (ESWT) has been frequently used in the treatment
of calcific tendinopathies. We have evaluated the effectiveness of radial ESWT on the group of 30 patients, aged
between 28 and 58 years, with calcific tendinitis of the shoulder. Criotherapy, medical exercises and radial ESWT were
applied. We used the radial ESWT device (BTL-5000 SWT®, Columbia, USA), 3 bars pressure, 10 Hz frequency, 2000
shocks. Patients were examined before the begining of the treatment, immediately after the treatment, and 6 months later.
The treatment included measurement of the range of motion (ROM), measurement of voluntary isometric contraction of
shoulder muscles with manual muscle test (MMT), and subjective assessment of pain intensity with visual analogue
scale (VAS). X-ray was done before and 6 month after treatment. The study has shown the efficiency of the treatment with
radial ESWT. The level of statistical significance was determined with student t-test. Radial ESWT applied to patients
with shoulder calcific lesions of the rotator cuff resulted in pain relief, increase in the range of motion and increase in the
muscular strength. As shown by X-ray, these results were followed by the decrease in the size of the rotator cuff calcifications.
Keywords
shoulder; callcific tendinopathies; extracorporeal shock wave therapy
Hrčak ID:
72274
URI
Publication date:
25.9.2011.
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