Why & How "Hanging" STOPS Shoulder Pain & Surgery

0:00 ♪ Bob and Brad ♪ ♪ The two most famous ♪ ♪ Physical therapists on the internet ♪ - (claps) Hi folks, I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist. - Brad Heineck, physical therapist. - And we are the most famous physical therapists on the internet. - In our opinion of course Bob. - Today we're going to discuss why and how hanging stops shoulder pain and surgery. - Hanging? - Yeah, this is something. By the way, when we first discovered this, we were really skeptics, weren't we? - Yeah, as a matter of fact, one of our viewers brought this book to our attention, and Bob, I think you ordered it to find out what it was all about. - Right, I really appreciate when viewers do this, cause they also put us on to a back book that I just have loved. That's been fantastic. - Sure. - By the way, if you're new to our channel,

0:45 please take a second to subscribe to us. We provide videos on how to stay healthy, fit, pain free. We upload every day. Also, you want to join us on our social media channels and our website because, (laughs) it's vibrating. We are always giving something away so if you go to bobandbrad.com, go to the giveaway section, and it'll show you what we're giving away right now. Go to Bob and Brad Facebook, it'll show up. And if you want a short version of Bob and Brad, go to Twitter and Instagram. We have a 60 second version of our show each day. So you want to show real quick what we're giving away, Brad? - This is the-- - I'll say it. - Say it, Bob. - He always messes it up. The Vibrating Peanut Massage Ball by the FITINDEX. Really cool device. It's kind of like a small foam roller, but it vibrates. Really well made. And this is, I know they have it on sale for like 30 bucks.

1:33 So it's really a good price. - And, yeah, it is built very well. You can sit down and work your calf muscles, your hamstring muscles. - I use it for my hip. - Hip, yeah. - It just works well. - Back, it works wonderful. We don't have time to show you how it works totally, but you'll have to believe us. We do have a video on it, don't we Bob? - Yeah, we do, absolutely. Okay, Brad, let's go to work. - All right, so, hanging. We brought this up, and we want to give all the credit to this, to Dr. John M. Kirsch. And I like Dr. Kirsch, he's from Stevens Point, 30 miles from where I grew up. - In Wisconsin. - Wisconsin, yes, so I feel like maybe some-- - Some kinship. - Yeah. - There we go. - Exactly, but, shoulder surgeon. Been around for many years. - Orthopedic surgeon.

2:19 - Right, and he's done a number of, he's got some studies. - Case studies. - Great scientific, as well as case histories where it actually helped people. It's just a great book, not only for a therapist, but it's written very well for the layperson. - Gives some nice examples, and I think he will convince you by the time you're done reading it. - We're going to show you how to do it and why it works in just a minute or two, but if you really want to understand it well. - Get into the details. - Don't hesitate. Go below the video and we got it hooked up to our favorite books we love, and it's right there. - All right, Brad. - Okay, so, with shoulder pain, the most common problem is impingement. SIS, subacromial impingement syndrome. - Absolutely. They say - I concur. - 90, 95% according to the book, and you know,

3:07 most people are going to agree with that. Unless you fell down and, you know, motorcycle accident or something like that. - Actually trauma. And the thing is, the impingement can lead to a tear. - Right, very common. - So, I mean even the rotator cuff tear can be maybe attributed to impingement. - So if you have problems reaching up, and you have that pain here, or that painful arc syndrome. It's, hurts here but not up here. Very good chance this is going to help. Okay, so should we show why it helps? - Yeah, let's see the reasoning, Brad. - Get over here, Sam. This is kind of getting a little ornery. There we go. So, if we look at the area, in the book he talks about this, through a good part of the book, is the acromion bone here, and the coracoid. - [Bob] Coracoid. - Yeah, coracoid here. And there's a ligament that connects the two.

3:54 Now what happens-- - [Bob] In this instance we put tape there, blue, the ligament was there already, but we highlighted it in blue. - So it's easy for you to see. So what happens is, the impingement occurs right here where I'm pointing with the pen. And you can see, there's not much room. This is a perfect model of having impinged. Now if I go up like this, look at how this pushes into that blue portion. - [Bob] This is one of the tendons of the muscle here, and you can see how that's the supraspinatus tendon, one of the most commonly involved tendons with impingement. - So, you can have surgery, and they can open this up, and grind some bone off, and cut some tissues away, and make a gap there so it works. Or, the hanging process actually remodels this,

4:41 opens up the gap, and that's the whole theory that the book talks about with great success you know, with people. - Why not try that first versus surgery? - Well, the surgeon don't like it. - Yeah, okay, well, he was putting himself out of business, because he's a surgeon. - Exactly. So if we look at, without the tendons here, but we want to get this gap right here, where it's tight, we want to open it up, not by moving this bone down, the humerus, but by making the gap in here larger, and that's done by the hanging process. So, is that it, is that clear? - That sounds good, yeah. - Crystal clear? - I think that's clear, Brad. - Liz concurs, there you go. All right Sam, you're fired. You're done for the day. All right, so the other thing that hanging does

5:27 is not only it reshapes that, but the shoulder blade really needs to have motion. So why don't you show, this is actually a model of a shoulder blade. - You can show it on me, Brad. - Oh, sure. - [Bob] Which one are you going to, the right one? - This one. So, when you go up like that, the shoulder blade does not go up and down, Bob. Yeah, just keep going, yep. The shoulder blade doesn't stay still like this. It actually needs to move along with the shoulder blade. Otherwise, you will not have full shoulder motion. So there's the muscles and the tissues that connect that, the hanging is going to stretch that out and allow that motion. - [Bob] If that doesn't move, you're only going to go this high. You have about 120 degrees, right? - I believe that's exactly right, Bob. Okay, anything else? Also, he claims it helps the rotator cuff tendons,

6:14 the integrity and tissue of the tendons. Now, how do you hang? You have to get something to hang at. A pull up bar works wonderful. And he's got about a half a dozen different options-- - [Bob] Of how to set up a pull up bar in your own house. - How to do it in your basement, in your yard, and actually in a hotel room. - [Bob] Oh, really? - Yeah. - Oh yeah, he goes all the way. So, the idea is, when you first start out, you start out with a partial hang. Now if you can, you know, if you're too short and you can't reach and you're not going to be able to partial hang. So you get a stool to raise yourself up. And then you go to here. Now this works good for me. I can grab here, and I'm just going to bend my knees and let a partial hang. Now, it's going to be painful, and he reports in the book that it's going to be painful,

7:00 and that's okay. He says you're not going to tear anything worse, just work with it for, start out the 10 seconds. Then come up. And the goal is 30 seconds, but anywhere between 10 to 30 seconds you start with. And then you give it about a minute or two break. Let your shoulders relax. And when you do this, the only thing, the only muscles in your body that should be tight is the muscles in your grip. - [Bob] Everything else you want to totally relax. - You're just hanging like a pendulum. And then eventually you'll get to where you can fully hang, and typically, like with me, when I hang, I don't even get 30 seconds and my hands get to be painful and tired. - [Bob] He does mention the use of your gloves.

7:46 - You can use gloves, and actually this is a little farther than this video goes, but there are devices you can get so you can let go and hooks that, but, that's another story. - [Bob] We'll get into that maybe in another video. - So, you're going to hang there for 30 seconds if you can tolerate it with your hands. One thing that I do sometimes, I correct myself, is I let my head go forward which is okay for my shoulders, but it's going to hurt my neck, so make sure your head is back where it belongs. It's very easy to let that go forward. - [Bob] By the way, do you know what I use when I do pull ups, Brad? - What? - I use a golf club. - Oh, golf clubs, there you go golfers. I could see that. I should have my bicycle gloves down there. - Yep, that would work. - Those fingerless, fingertipless ones. - You know, if you got more grip,

8:31 I mean a bit more friction. And it makes it easier, you don't have to grip as hard. So you don't have to work as hard. - Big, important point, and we had people comment on this. Make sure you grab forward, not this way. - Very good point. - Palms away from you. - Palms away from you. Excellent point. - And then, as you get more advanced, he talks about swinging forward and backwards really relaxed. But to get started, and he says to do this for 10 to 15 minutes. So you're going to hang, you know, 10 to 30 seconds, whatever-- - You don't do it that long Brad, do you? - No, I don't. I mean, but I don't have a shoulder problem either. Mine is more as a maintenance program. So, you're going to have to use your judgment with that. Again, but that's what he recommends for people to start with.

9:16 - That's a long time. - And he's the doctor. - We've seen some success with this kind of using different devices. I mean, I definitely have seen it help. - And it helps my back as well. That's something he doesn't get into, because you're putting some traction to your back. - That's the other bonus thing. So it decompresses the back. - So, once again, Bob. Bob, once again, once again. - We can fix just about anything. - Except for... - A broken heart. - There you go. - But we're working on it. I'm going to get some room for the heart, there. - Yeah, get a big, fat heart there. Cracked down the middle. - Yeah, there we go. - We could get a sewing machine and start sewing. - There we go. That's a good visual. Thanks for watching.