Shoulder Arthroscopy & Rotator Cuff Repair

A painful shoulder that will not let you sleep, lift your arm, or reach behind your back is usually the rotator cuff. At Sama Hospital — a NABH-accredited, doctor-owned hospital in South Delhi — rotator cuff repair is done by arthroscopic (keyhole) surgery, as day-care in most cases.

But most shoulders that come through our door do not need an operation at all, and we will say so.

Four tendons wrap around the head of the humerus and hold the shoulder in its socket while the big muscles move it. They are what allow you to lift and rotate your arm at all.

They wear with age, and they tear — sometimes suddenly with a fall or a lift, more often gradually, with no single moment you can point to.

• Pain on lifting the arm overhead, or reaching into a back pocket
• Night pain, especially lying on that side — the most characteristic symptom, and often the one that finally decides people
• Weakness, not just pain — the arm gives up rather than hurts
• A catching or grating sensation

This confusion causes a great deal of wrong treatment, so it is worth being clear.

A frozen shoulder is stiff. You cannot move it, and neither can anyone else — even with the muscles relaxed, the joint will not go. A rotator cuff tear is weak and painful, but somebody else can usually still move the shoulder for you.

Frozen shoulder almost never needs surgery. It needs time, physiotherapy, and sometimes an injection. It is particularly common in people with diabetes. Operating on a frozen shoulder in the belief that it is a cuff tear helps nobody.

Often not. Many partial tears — and even some full-thickness tears in older, less demanding shoulders — settle well with a proper course of physiotherapy.

Surgery is considered when a decent course of physiotherapy has failed, when there is genuine weakness rather than just pain, and in younger patients with an acute traumatic tear — where repairing it sooner gives a better result.

Arthroscopic. Small incisions, a camera, and the torn tendon reattached to bone with anchors. Any bone spur pinching the tendon is shaved away at the same time. Day-care or one overnight stay.

• Weeks 0–6 — a sling, to protect the repair. This is not negotiable: the tendon has to heal onto bone, and it cannot do that while you are using it.
• Months 2–3 — progressive physiotherapy; comfortable daily use returns
• Months 4–6 — full strength

People consistently underestimate this recovery. Tell us now if six weeks in a sling is impossible for your work — it changes the conversation.

What moves the figure: the size of the tear and the number of anchors needed; whether other work (bone spur, biceps tendon, joint surface) is done at the same sitting; anaesthesia, room category and length of stay.

We quote an all-inclusive package, confirmed after clinical assessment, with cashless treatment available for eligible insurance patients. See our cost estimate page.

Doctor-owned, NABH-accredited, in South Delhi since 1982, with nine orthopaedic consultants named on this page. The surgeon who assesses you is the surgeon who operates — and if your shoulder is frozen rather than torn, you will be told that rather than operated on.

No. Many partial tears, and some full-thickness tears in older patients, do well with physiotherapy. Surgery is for tears that fail physiotherapy, for real weakness, and for younger patients with acute traumatic tears.

No. Frozen shoulder is stiff — nobody can move it. A cuff tear is weak and painful, but the shoulder can usually still be moved passively. Frozen shoulder almost never needs surgery.

A sling for four to six weeks, then progressive physiotherapy. Comfortable daily use by three months; full strength at four to six.

Night pain lying on the affected side is one of the most characteristic signs of rotator cuff disease. It is a real clinical finding — tell your surgeon about it.

Yes — small incisions, camera, day-care or one night. The shoulder is not opened.