I oftentimes see patients in my clinic who have irreparable rotator cuff tears, or I’ve been told before that their tear is no longer repairable. Oftentimes, these patients are told that the only option for them is a reverse shoulder replacement, which is a very big procedure. And indicated in the right person, it sometimes is the right procedure.
But there’s a lot of new technology and a lot of new techniques out there for treating tears that are no longer repairable. There’s things called subacromial spacers which help restore the normal biomechanics of the shoulder and other techniques like a lower trapezius tendon transfer which can do very well for the right patient.
The key for me is finding the right patient based on their age, activity level, and what their goals are and trying to direct the right procedure for each individual patient. If you’ve been told before that you have a tear that’s no longer repairable, feel free to come in and we can kind of go over the options and see if there’s potentially an option for you other than a shoulder replacement.
