Bump from long ago! Found this topic on Google. Was considering skydiving and curious if my shoulder would be good enough after my surgery. Just happened to run upon this topic. I’ve never skydived. In fact, I’m not sure if I ever will just to not mess with it – but I sure would like to do so. But for anyone reading this in the future – I’ll share my shoulder experience… Dislocated 20+ times myself. (right shoulder, I’m mid 20’s.) First time it happened snowboarding. Later on it happened literally getting clothes out of the dryer. Stretching with my arms above head. One time even turning over sleeping! (talk about scary – you wake up in pain, wondering what the heck just happened!) Anyway, after 8 years finally visited an orthopedic surgeon I trusted about this. Turns out I had a bankart legion problem, as others here have had. I had a lot of time to research it – and learned a few things. If you do surgery – do it right! First – do it “open”, not “orthoscopic”! Orthoscopicly more or less means they try not to leave a scar and do it with a very tiny external wound. Open means they literally make a 5 inch slice (in my situation) which leaves a very nice battle wound. Starts a little in the armpit – goes straight up from there about 4 inches. Literally – while some doctors might say otherwise – letting them slice your shoulder up allows them to go in and do what they need to do to fix the problem! As others have said here – if you dislocate after surgery it sounds like you are in a big mess. Surgery takes care of 95% of people for life. If you dislocate after surgery – you’re likely to have lots more problems in the future. If curious – search google for “open bankart repair”. You’re likely to find some nice nasty pics of the surgery and details of what is done. (At least if you have an anterior problem in my case.) Second – if you have the surgery do it with a well known doctor! I honestly believe your doctor is one of the bigger factors! While this is a fairly common surgery – your doctor can easily over-tighten you or not tighten you up enough! Someone that is on top of their game will analyze and do it right. In fact – until your shoulder is open, it’s very hard for them to tell exactly what the exact nature of the problem is. I’m nearly at 11 months now and have not had a problem since. (One or two times a quick, mediocre pain for a half a second. I think this is more of my mind thinking about it than anything else. Nothing serious. No popping / cracking sound as shoulders often do.) To answer a few other questions brought up here… For the surgery I had to go under for I think 4 hours. It was an outpatient surgery meaning I left that day. They tightened the ligaments and screwed them to the bone with a couple tiny screws. I was told it would be a very painful recovery for a few days. In fact I kept on the Vicoden and did not feel a single ounce of pain from the surgery. Most people were shocked (doctors, physical therapists, nurses) that it went so easy for me. The PT afterwards went on for 3 months very vigorously. The PT was the most difficult part – not because it was painful – but because you want to do a good job stretching the ligaments and rebuilding the muscle to completely heal the surgery. If you do the surgery – do the PT afterwards!!! Otherwise you might very well be wasting money. I’ve kept on the PT since the surgery. Overall I think the surgery (doctors bills, anesthesia, PT, hospital bills, etc) ran about $14k. With insurance I paid about $2500 of that. The doc I found is a very well know doc in my area – and with insurance did not cost a dime more than a 1-year med student grad would have. In fact – I was shocked he was able to fit me into his schedule with just 6 weeks time. Anyway – hope this might help anyone here in the future. My doctor and physical therapist recommended no physical activates for 6 months. I decided to give it a year just to be safe and strengthen properly. It’s a year of my life – but well worth it. And lastly – now it’s my left shoulder that is the “bad” one. Actually – not “bad”. However, my right shoulder is much stronger and better than my left as funny as that is. I’ve never had problems with the left shoulder. Though – when working out it tends to be the left shoulder that is in pain and wants to quit before the right. I do think this is due to the fact that I rebuilt the right and did more PT on it for the first 4 months. (don’t worry – I’m not lopsided!) But as the right got fixed – interesting how I now notice the left is now not as strong! * no – I’m not a doctor! Just my personal experience. And I definitely don’t know all the details. Although I have a copy of my surgery report – it’s nearly a foreign language to me!
