Today I read a book about the most common medical procedures. I don’t really know why I picked it up, but it was on the shelf of this restaurant I went to, and since I was waiting for my friend to arrive I thought it would be a good way to pass the time.
I flipped to a page about shoulders and all the different problems and injuries that can happen to them. Many of them are related to age and other sports injuries. I read for a little while about this procedure that’s called a shoulder joint replacement surgery, and apparently, thousands of people have to get it done each year. However, that number pales in comparison to the hundreds of thousands of people who receive knee and hip replacement surgery.
The general advice seems to be that most people should only receive shoulder surgery when other nonsurgical treatments such as medication and movement and activity are not doing anything to help. I’ve strolled past this shoulder surgeon operating in Melbourne several times and have noticed some people walking out with their arms in slings. It makes me wonder what their injuries are and what sort of recovery they are going to have. For some people, their recovery after a shoulder surgery can involve months of physical therapy. For others, it can be a little bit quicker. It depends on the person and the extent of their injury.
While reading the book, I also learned about what a shoulder replacement surgery is. It’s where the damaged parts of the shoulder are removed and then get replaced with artificial ones, which is called a prosthesis. When my friend arrived, I closed the book and started chatting to her as usual, but now I know a lot more facts about shoulders! I ordered scrambled eggs and we started a conversation in which she was very interested in learning more about what I had read inside the book. She is a medical student so she understands more than I do and could offer some more interesting facts.