Hey, I've read a lot of the posts on here, before and after my surgery last year. I'll probably post a more thorough posting all about my journey with this problem I've had in my shoulder for years.

What I would like to know, is for a SLAP tear repair surgery with 2 anchors, is it normal procedure to shave away some of the bone?

I'm asking because I'm 11 months post-surgery. Found out the surgeon didn't shave away any bone, and i have moderate downsloping which is now causing an impingement. I'm 10x worse then before surgery, and a new ortho checked over all my mri's, x-rays, emg's, exams, surgery reports etc,. And told me the surgeon should have shaved away some of the bone to make room for inflammation and further problems like im having. And Suggests another surgery to cut away some of the bone and make room, which would alleviate the pain and problems im having now.

So again, I want to know if its normal procedure to shave away some bone, and if so did I pick the wrong ortho to do my surgery.

The surgeon may not have performed an acromioplasty because your shoulder may not have required one when he examined you in surgery. The impingement that you have gotten now may be a result of poor posture/scapular control and not training your RC muscles correctly. This can be common as a result of not using those muscles whilst immobilised in a sling for an extended period of time.

What i am since discovering is that even shaving the bone back isn't a guarantee that things will improve. I had this done 12 months ago and now I am getting a bad pinching pain in a different area of my shoulder that I have never felt before - and its getting worse and worse and i am not even using the shoulder for anything active or physical.

I have had it done three times. Did it help? I don't know, all were done within less than 2 years. Why he found a spur the second time, or had to even things out the third, I don't know. I have no issue or problem with either surgeon - just the first OS who refused to treat me and the one who yelled at me

Wow...I am happy to see that there is a growing body of perceptivity (is that a word?) that not everybody gets better with a SLAP repair....and some even get worse (a lot worse)!

It's a crap shoot...

I just had a SLAP repair a couple of weeks ago. The doc shaved down the bone, fixed the repair with two anchors, and decompressed. It felt better immediately. The only soreness that I have now is the upper bicep to the shoulder, which is from the actual repair itself I'm assuming. I started PT this week and the PT looked over everything that the doc had done and said "Well if you're gonna do it, do it right, and he definitely did". So just based on that and how awesome my recovery has been, I'd say it's probably normal to shave down the bone a little bit. After just two weeks I can almost lift my arm over my head!

builder1 wrote:


The more I read about slap tear repair surgeries and shoulder problems, the more I think this will never get any better. Dealing with Pain management doctors is a hassle to say the least. I had an ultrasound done to look at the shoulder muscle, and the Supraspinatus muscle is still 1/4th the size in comparison to the opposite shoulder. And I've been in PT since 2 weeks after surgery, almost going on a year now.

Nothing seems to help :/. Still ice it every night, still have to take pain pills everyday. Working out to strengthen the muscles causes inflammation which pinches on a nerve from the downsloping in the acromion.

I was hoping someone had the bone shaved post-op and it helped the pain. Has anyone even had a 100% recovery from pain with shoulder surgery?