Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff
by Jim Johnson
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Book Reviews of Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff
Book Review: Simple, Straight Forward, effective
Summary: 5 Stars
This information is excellent. You could find it by hunting around the internet and youtube on how to rehab/prehab your rotator cuff, but the author puts it all in one spot for you. The explainations of the anatomy and mechanics of the shoulder joint are very good, understandable and not overwhelming.
The stretches and exercises are simple and divided in to three sections: beginer, intermediate, and advanced. They are grouped depending on your range of motion/injury severity. The book gives you the tests to check your ROM.
Here's the testimonial: I am a life long athlete and been blessed with few injuries over time. I am dedicated to strength training in conjunction with the sports I do and do a lot of overhead lifts. I swim, run, mountain bike and am a serious rock climber. I developed a pinch in my rear shoulder that was causing a weakness in my overhead lifts. I tried to train through it, but it was becoming more painful. I was considering going to an ortho, which is always the last resort, but after poking around the net and finding some exercises and stretches, I cured it to about 80%. I picked up this book and now I am 100% and have full ROM and strength. I could have saved a ton of time and effort if I had known about this book from the start.
The author addresses everyone from the senior citizen to the conditioned athlete and discusses how by doing the simple exercises and stretches a few minutes (literally - the routines only take about 5min a day) a day after you are 100% you can maintain the strength in your rotator cuff muscles as what many would call "pre-hab." He also supports his information with scientific studies. This was very impressive to me because I have read some of the same studies dealing with theories on stretching and strength training (physiology and training is an interest of mine and I read about it often).
It is well worth the price, even though it is a short book.
Book Review: Encouraging if nothing else
Summary: 4 Stars
I suffered a rotator cuff injury about five weeks ago that left me with little pain but some restricted movement. I'm under the care of a physical therapist right now, and I bought this book to get a cheap second opinion on how to treat this injury.
The highlights of this book include a brief but well written overview of just what a rotator cuff is and how it works. I wish the drawings were larger and clearer, and that's why I coulndn't give this book a five star rating.
The other highlight, to me anyway, is the section containing descriptions of all the exercises that are used to rehabilitate a rotator cuff.
That said, I don't think this book actually gave me any knowledge that I would not have already obtained without it. Just during doctor and physical therapy visits I learned all about the rotator cuff and the bones and muscles, and that the one thing that is needed to settle exactly what injury you are dealing with is an MRI. Also, the exercise descriptions are rather standard and ironically my physical therapist assigned me three new exercises the morning after I read about them in this book.
Still, this book was enouraging to me if for no other reason that it quoted a number of studies that prove the importance of exercise to rehabilitate a shoulder after such an injury.
But the bottom line to me is that nobody should just try to "treat their own" rotator cuff injury without consultation with a doctor and without some physical therapy.
Postscript. About a year after my injury occurred, it had corrected itself. My sports doctor said it would take about a year to heal, and that's exactly what happened. No exercises seemed to make a difference. It seemed to be a minor inflammation of a lining around a bone in a socket, and when that inflammation goes away, movement returns.
Book Review: The "for dummies" book of rotator cuff information.
Summary: 3 Stars
Unlike another critical reviewer here, I think that there is great benefit to understanding how your rotator cuff works before detailing exercises for strengthening it. To this aim, Wikipedia can help greatly. If you can't seem to grasp the information on Wikipedia, maybe this book would be a good bet.
However, I, for one, didn't care for having to sort through pages of substance-anemic content to cherry-pick the useful bits; it took me a day to review what I should have been able to glean in one hour.
For example, do I need, in my book on rotator cuffs, to read three pages about how a randomized controlled trial works? IF I don't already know, then I can look it up. Or put it in a glossary; that's what glossaries are for. Do I need to read wordy, precise details of each study? Cite the study, describe the outcome, and be done with it. _Maybe_ put the details in an appendix; either way, I can look it up later if I like. Do I need constant repetition, reminding, and teaching that appears to be geared toward a child? If you read each of these critiques thinking, "that's exactly what I need!" then you won't be disappointed.
"Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff" is not a cheap book, and there honestly isn't a whole lot of content. It _does_ contain some useful information, but getting to this information with the limited table of contents, without section references, with no table of diagrams, with random pointless tangents, and with NO INDEX, can be frustrating.
Book Review: Whoopee, Hallelujah, and Hooray!
Summary: 5 Stars
Just the information needed to help you and not more! That's "Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff." Johnson writes clearly for the non-medical-professional, so you'll understand his message easily and get started right away (today).
About six months ago, I fell. A perfect four-point landing, I thought at the time, but it turned out to be more, much more. Within a month I began having trouble pulling a shirt on over my head. Then shoulder and arm pain settled in full time.
I decided to forego conventional medical treatment (for example, shots and surgery), and the pain continued. In fact, it not only continued, but grew so much worse that I considered revising my decision about the shots. However, finding this book and reading the glowing recommendations for it, I decided giving managing the problem on my own one last try.
Of course, getting the book did not solve the problem by itself. I had to use the information to stretch and exercise. So I did, and, sure enough, after a couple of weeks I saw both improved range of motion and less pain.
The stretches and exercises are not necessarily pleasant, but the results make it worth the effort.
If you have rotator cuff pain, get this book. Regardless of whether you decide on conventional solutions to the problem, you'll need the stretches and exercises to regain full range of motion. Stick with the program. It works!
Highly recommended.
Book Review: Great evidence-based book!
Summary: 5 Stars
A thousand thank yous to Mr. Johnson for being one of the very few self-help-book authors to base all of his recommendations on well-designed scientific studies. On this point alone, Mr. Johnson's book stands head-and-shoulders above nearly all others of its ilk. A job very-well done!
The next reason that I really like this book is that it only takes a few minutes per day to do the exercises. Yes, folks, rehabilitating your shoulders can really be done without needing to place the rest of your life on hold to make time for endless physical-therapy visits and countless mind-numbingly-boring exercises. While the exercises are still mind-numbingly-boring, you can finish them up well before your favorite news program has finished its coverage of the war in Afghanistan and moved on to the war in Iraq!
And are the exercises in the book effective? I have to admit that as soon as I realized that they were based on actual scientific evidence, my placebo response went into full swing, and my shoulders felt better before I had even started the exercises!
However, I've now been doing the exercises for around three months, long-enough for the placebo response to wear off, and my shoulders have definitely improved. The trick for me is to be consistent and do the exercises as specified. I found that it helped to read the book a second time, because I had missed and forgotten important details.
I highly recommend this book!