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Lifting weights may also help strengthen and tone your higher arms. However should you overdo it when lifting weights and even simply shifting heavy bins, you may make your biceps pop — and never in a great way. A tear can produce a painful damage often called a Popeye deformity.
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There are two tendons in your biceps — one connects to the quick head of the biceps and the opposite connects to the lengthy head. The lengthy head of your biceps goes into your shoulder.
“When that tendon tears, your muscle contracts like a ball that appears like Popeye when he eats spinach, which is why this damage is colloquially often called the Popeye deformity,” says sports activities medication doctor Dominic King, DO.
Listed below are 3 ways to keep away from this damage.
1. Don’t overdo it
Overusing your biceps over time can inflame the tendons. If these infected tendons are usually not correctly handled, they’ll lose their capability to operate.
“That degeneration could cause weak point and may result in a tendon tearing and rupturing,” Dr. King says.
So attempt to not overwork your muscle mass. And don’t raise heavy objects by yourself. Ask for assist, he advises.
If you happen to’re lifting one thing heavy from the ground, all the time bend on the knees as a substitute of bending over from the waist. Additionally, by no means raise one thing heavy above your shoulders.
2. Go low and sluggish
Watch out should you’re studying a brand new weightlifting method or beginning a brand new, intense health coaching routine, equivalent to CrossFit.
Even should you’re feeling high-quality and really feel as if you’re in nice bodily form, you all the time need to go low and begin sluggish, Dr. King says.
“If you happen to’ve by no means lifted heavy weights or participated in CrossFit or finished these large, explosive forms of boot camps, you actually ought to ease into it,” he says. “Along with the persistent change your tendon undergoes earlier than tearing, a big load positioned in your arm in a short time is what sometimes causes it to tear.”
3. Take heed to your physique
There’s a distinction between soreness and ache and it’s vital to grasp that distinction. Soreness is a discomfort that you simply get after exercising that goes away in a few days after relaxation. Ache is one thing that you simply expertise throughout train.
“In case you have vital ache throughout exercise, it’s a warning signal out of your physique telling you that this isn’t simply the traditional soreness you get from exercising and utilizing muscle mass,” Dr. King says. “There truly is likely to be one thing flawed.”
Instantly cease the exercise when you begin to really feel ache, he advises. Anti-inflammatory medication and icing the supply of the ache could assist at the start. However don’t ignore the ache if it continues.
“If there’s injury, your physique is definitely actually good at caring for it,” he says. “But when your physique can not handle it by itself, taking anti-inflammatories and icing for months on finish won’t heal what’s going on. It is going to scale back some irritation however it won’t truly repair what’s flawed.”
In case you have vital ache for longer than two weeks and it’s lowering your capability to operate, it’s time to see a doctor.
Treating your damage
For such a damage, your physician will consider your total shoulder to ensure there’s no rotator cuff tear or different shoulder injury, Dr. King says.
“If it’s only a tear of the lengthy head biceps tendon, it’s routinely taken care of non-operatively,” he says. “Within the quick time period, we work on vary of movement to make sure that the shoulder doesn’t get stiff.”
For the reason that Popeye deformity causes a considerable amount of bruising and swelling, alternating between heat compresses and ice may also help in lowering irritation and conserving the muscle mass from getting stiff.
By way of bodily remedy, sufferers will endure a progressive program of stretching and strengthening to get again as a lot regular operate as attainable, Dr. King says.
“John Elway [former Denver Broncos quarterback] tore his lengthy head biceps tendon and he didn’t get it surgically mounted,” he says. “And he went on to win two Tremendous Bowls.”
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