Shoulder Arthritis: How to Tell If It's Time to Consider Replacement
Most shoulder problems people come in with have a clear starting point — a fall, a sports injury, a specific day things went wrong. Arthritis rarely works that way. It tends to be the shoulder pain that's been there for years, slowly getting a little worse each season, until one day lifting a bag onto a shelf or reaching behind your back has become genuinely difficult rather than just uncomfortable. That slow, grinding pattern is usually the first hint that something more than a strain is going on. Shoulder arthritis is the gradual wearing away of the cartilage that lets the ball and socket of the shoulder glide smoothly against each other. Once enough cartilage is gone, bone starts moving against bone, and that's what produces the deep ache, stiffness, and grinding sensation people describe. Mild to moderate cases are managed for years with medication, injections, and physiotherapy. When the joint has worn down enough that none of that helps anymore, shoulder replacement be...