Has anyone undergone a bone resection/arthroplasty before? I had a fall a year ago and messed up shoulder at the SC joint, where the clavicle meets the sternum. I’m having surgery to essentially shorten my clavicle so the two bones don’t grate on one another and cause early arthritis and pain. Has anyone experienced this type of surgery before? What was the recovery timeline like? There’s no soft tissue or ligament involvement (not reconstructing the ligaments). I asked what a realistic timeline is and my ortho just said I’ll have to take it easy for a couple months. So like only ride one horse a day? I’m young and otherwise super healthy with great mobility and strength. I had knee surgery and was back to full work/sports about 2 months ahead of schedule doing all my own rehab. I feel a bit like an anomaly discussing this with my ortho because I don’t think I’m the “normal” patient. TIA!
I had a Grade 5 AC Joint dislocation repair last month done last month. From my research, shoulders rehabilitation programs are all different. Did you get your surgery yet? Don’t have any great insight except be ready to sleep in a recliner or on a wedge.
I had a similar thing done to my left foot last summer. I had a chunk of bone taken out between 2 bones that weren’t supposed to be stuck together.
It wasn’t bad. The biggest PITA was being non-weight bearing for a week, not an issue for shoulders, probably some time immobilized. The rehab was straightforward and pretty quick since there was no soft tissue to heal. Took about 8 weeks to “heal” before I could start rehab. I drove horses a few times while I was in the boot; I knew there was little damage I could do.
My foot was pretty sensitive to weather for a while. Last month or so, it hasn’t been an issue.
I did-- back in early November. It was easier in some ways than expected as I wasn’t limited in using my arm and moving it didn’t hurt. However, I had a lot of muscle issues from nearly a year of using my arm improperly after the fall. Now, my ortho thinks I did the same thing on the AC side. I knew when I fell it messed up my shoulder…
I am just getting ready to go back to ortho for second checkup and the YEAH I get to start Physical Therapy. I hope to get info on when I can start riding again…
Did you ever have this done? I need to have surgery on both my SC joints (left one at the end of Feb 2025 and then the right one at the end of May 2025.). It’s such a rare joint compared to the AC (other end of the shoulder.) I noticed that there weren’t any replies to your original post from people who actually had SC joint surgery. I’d love to know how your recovery was. Can you use the joint without significant pain now? I don’t have any ligaments involved either. Thanks!
I did. The worst part of recovery was the sternoclemastoid muscle was cut as part of the open procedure and the internal sutures were incredibly tight that I could barely turn my head one direction. I never had an issues with the actual SC joint or pain from it and had full immediate use and ROM with no immobilization post op. I later had AC surgery because I still had issues. After still having issues even after that surgery, I worked with a fantastic PT and my issue was purely muscular where some muscles in my back atrophied after I originally fell because it did hurt. And then they never fired correctly which made me use my shoulder muscles and ligaments differently than intended which caused the pain. But they weren’t the primary issue.
But to the original question—the muscle in the neck was kind of terrible. But I never had issues using my arm. You’ll also have a fairly prominent scar.
