Shoulder Exercises With Impingement?

[pierrec]

Hey all,

I was recently diagnosed with shoulder impingement, which, is somewhat serious and could lead to debilitating problems if untreated. As a result, I'm not going to be able to do any shoulder presses or bench presses while I'm undergoing therapy for what my physician says is going to last at least 3-4 months. I do not want to lose the gains I've made on my shoulders - are there any exercises that anyone here would recommend I can do to continue developing my shoulders without stressing my rotator cuff?

You might be wondering why I'm not asking my physician - and the answer to that is that I'm at senior at college, and my insurance plan only has providers where I live, which is far from college. I cannot start treatment until I got home. I've been off my shoulders for around 2 months now, and I'm beginning to see the results of my training fade.

I've been doing pull-ups, which help a bit, since they develop my lats, but I'm still looking for something that targets my shoulders more.

Thanks!

Best,
Pierre

[Boss Man]

Many exercises utilise the Rotator Cuff, like Upright Rows, Side Raises, Shoulder Presses, Bench Presses, Military Presses, Front Raises, Shrugs, Lying Side Raises, Stiff Arm Pullovers, etc, so you would have to try some movements without weight, to see if you could even do the full range of motion.

Assuming this to be so, you could do 2-3 reps with as little weight as possible to assess your tolerance to it, then if that felt fine, use the next amount of weight up and keep doing that, until you found a level that started to cause mild discomfort, at which point work with the previous amount, as then you would have identified your upper limit for tolerance.

The possibility is though, you may find some or all of the movements you try unweighted, would be flawed, by being not able to be completed, through either the inception of pain and / or just locking up or extreme stiffness, in which case you would have to void any further attempts at those exercises and chalk them up as non-go's until further notice.