[Redwood]

The cause of my injury is a bit unusual but it would seem I share symptoms with many other participants of this forum.

[*]I had shoulder replacement surgery in 2016[*]My recovery has been poor. I had substantially more pain than the average patient during initial recovery, and persistent pain since then.[*]My pain isn't so much in the shoulder joint but the surrounding structures[*]My range of motion is very poor in both adduction (reach across chest) and abduction (lateral arm raise)[*]I have substantial scapular winging[*]I have diligently and aggressively followed all physical therapy protocols[*]I only learned a few weeks go that the surgery caused damage to my spinal accessory nerve and as a result my trapezius is paralyzed[*]I've been working so hard on the PT that my deltoids, rhomboids, and rotator cuff were masking the fact that my trap wasn't working at all[*]But for several months the atrophy in my trap has become very visible and obvious[/LIST]
I am extremely demoralized right now because everything I'm reading indicates the window of opportunity to repair a damaged SAN is less than 2 years and it's been almost 3 for me. Mine is probably not severed; it was probably a stretch injury from bad positioning either during or immediately after surgery.

For the last six weeks since my initial diagnosis I have been waiting as fast as I can for referrals to specialists who can help me but the system is really dragging its feet. An initial EMG was erroneously arranged to examine my Long Thoracic Nerve, which was obviously irrelevant. An MRI did not indicate a cyst or tumor or any other artifact that might be compressing the SAN but did not look at the SAN itself, so I still don't actually have a specific quantitative diagnosis, just a visual from a couple different docs who agree, yeah, that trapezius is obviously paralyzed so it must be the SAN that's affected.

As you might imagine, I am rather desperate to get some traction on this situation as soon as possible.