dd having shoulder trouble

[Carly]

See, that's the part I don't get. I know teams who will ride one pitcher 6-9 games over a weekend. Her team has four good pitchers and the circle time is very balanced. She doesn't work out every day but maybe 3-4 days a week, 30 minute sessions and then during tournaments no more than a game a day. Hopefully we get some answers tomorrow.

Everyone is different. I've seen plenty of kids with terrible mechanics go forever with no ill effects, probably because their bodies are just naturally equipped to handle that particular stress. There are countless natural weaknesses one might have that could result in pain/injury even with better mechanics and less pitching time.

 

[mad hornet]

Just got back from the doctor. She has been diagnosed with "proximal humeral apophysitis". Basically, it's an irritated growth plate in her upper humerus where it connects to the shoulder. He says it's relatively common for kids her age, especially softball pitchers (who knew?). The centrifugal force from pitching over time has caused a small amount of separation in that growth plate which he was able to see on an X-ray. Since she has no pain at any time other than pitching, she can still play other positions and hit, but no pitching for 4 weeks. We go back for a follow up July 9. Hopefully she'll be back pitching in some capacity by our final three tournaments.

 

[GOINGDEEP]

Well, it doesn't sound too bad, thank goodness. Growth plate problems are pretty common at all ages and all parts of the body. My nephew had these problems young, now he plays D2 baseball with no problems.

What type of doctor did you see? Sure hope your luck is better than ours. We first went to DD's general practitioner ( one diagnosis ), then to an Ortho group ( another diagnosis ), then to a sports Ortho specialist ( final correct diagnosis ).

 

[mad hornet]

It was a sports medicine specialist MD who sees a lot of athletes from Otterbein University here locally. The PT we saw initially is a mom of a player on my team who works at the college and referred him. He also treated another one of our players in the early spring for a different shoulder issue that was growth plate related (a pitcher and competitive swimmer in the winter) and she is doing great now (pitched a CG Victory in our championship game this past Sunday). So I am confident dd is in good hands. Time will tell for sure though.

 

[MandM]

mad hornet, thanks for letting us know the outcome. I wish your DD a speedy recovery to return to what she enjoys!

I wonder if this is a bit like Osgood-Schlatter (?), where there is inflammation at the insertion of the patella tendon on the tibia, and I think there is some analogous thing on the foot or ankle. These are specific to growing children, and ultimately, when the growth plates close, the problem goes away. It is treated as you describe for your DD. Anyway, it seems similar but I was not aware it could affect the shoulder as well and it is good to know.

 

[mad hornet]

mad hornet, thanks for letting us know the outcome. I wish your DD a speedy recovery to return to what she enjoys!

I wonder if this is a bit like Osgood-Schlatter (?), where there is inflammation at the insertion of the patella tendon on the tibia, and I think there is some analogous thing on the foot or ankle. These are peculiar to growing children, and ultimately, when the growth plates close, it goes away. It seems similar but I was not aware it could affect this area as well and it is good to know.

I have no idea. I think one of our other pitchers has that although her mom called it "Patellar Tendonitis". She is wearing braces under her knees. The explanation I got was she is growing rapidly (her dad is pretty tall) and her muscles / tendons aren't keeping pace with the bones. Poor kid could barely run in our games on Sunday. Luckily was able to get her a courtesy / pinch runner and rest her on the bench some.

But according to her mom, her doc says she has to grind it out and play through the pain. Supposedly rest and inactivity will exacerbate this problem.

 

[MandM]

did a little investigating, is it possibly "Proximal humeral epiphysiolysis"? Google that and there is a document called "little league shoulder" - gives nice explanation- sounds like the same, but is not like OS. If you can't find it and are interested to see LMK and I can send.

 

[mad hornet]

I looked it up and it appears similar. He wrote it down for me so there was no mistaking the word Apophysitis for Epiphysiolysis although I don't pretend to know the difference between the two words. She doesn't have the other symptoms of Little League Shoulder though. No tenderness or loss of strength or flexibility. He had her do all kinds of moves and tests for this. She has no pain except when she's pitching and even then it's not all the time.

It is interesting that you bring this up though. The last thing the doctor said as we were leaving is "Now if you look this up on Google don't be alarmed. There is a lot of worst case stuff about this on the internet."

 

[halskinner]

Where exactly does it hurt?

 

[Groundhog32]

Glad to hear that your daughter is "OK" and should heal up fine. Best of Luck.