Originally Posted by
Garfield Cat
How does one know if its nerve damage or if its must muscles or other temporary things?
The symptoms are typically intermittent pain in either the shoulder blade or arm and possibly numbness or tingling, in my case in my left thumb. The pain feels like a mild electric shock as it travels down the entire nerve when it is irritated at the vertebrae. An MRI is only way to get a definitive diagnosis of what is provoking the nerve. It can be temporary. For example cervical traction will often fix the symptoms by widening the gap between the vertebrae (temporarily) as can improving your posture, e.e. neck tuck ('bent style) as opposed to neck lift (DF style).