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Shoulder disease
Patient book


Answers to the most common questions from everyday life in my practice
Text and photos: Dr. Thomas von Rothkirch
Released in 2009
Hardcover, 64 pages, A5
Thomas von Rothkirch

Since the beginning of my medical practice, I have felt the need to involve my patients, to inform them about their diagnosis and the possibilities of therapy.
This coincides with the wish of many sick people. Many today are much better informed than ever before through the media, mostly television and radio. You can get detailed information about all possible clinical pictures on the Internet at any time. But do you understand what you read correctly?
I often make sketches for my patients during the conversation in the practice and try to explain their clinical picture and the therapy options not in technical jargon but in understandable words in German.
However, there is often a lot of information that needs to be understood and memorized. In addition, some things are quickly forgotten or not understood as they should be.
From this experience, I and my mentor, François M. Presley, had the idea of making the most common clinical pictures in the field of orthopedics and rheumatology understandable in book form.
In this book I explain shoulder diseases. As in the consultation hour, I use pictures in this book that I have made myself, that is, drawn or made on the computer.
I do not claim to be complete.
Nevertheless, you will certainly find adequate explanations for many of the terms and clinical pictures you have already heard, and you will hopefully understand your particular problem better.
from the content

It was only around 25 years ago that the most common complaints in the shoulder area began to be broken down into various clinical pictures and these findings were also passed on to prospective doctors at universities. Knowledge about this has not yet fully established itself in everyday practice. Here is an example:

In the past it was common - and this is still the case today - painful disorders of the shoulder, the cause of which could not be identified with the help of an X-ray, the conventional examination method, as "shoulder-arm syndrome" or "humeroscapular periarthritis" (periarthrititis means "inflammation in the joint area", "humeroscapularis" includes the term "humerus" for humerus and "scapula" for shoulder blade). These terms seem to characterize a certain clinical picture, but include a large number of different diseases and are therefore not the basis for a meaningful treatment.
If the diagnosis is not clear, the therapy is usually unsuccessful and you, the patient, keep your symptoms.
In the following, I will show you the most common symptoms in the shoulder area. Before that you will get an insight into the most important anatomical structures of the shoulder.

For a better understanding I mainly use German terms for anatomical and medical terms. In the illustrations, especially the anatomical ones, the medical terms are listed in brackets under the German. A complete list of medical terms can be found in the appendix. The images always show the right shoulder.
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