They gave me a cortisone shot in the shoulder and a list of recovery exercises that I will do on my own. He also said to lay off the Chuck Norris TotalGym thing for a while. It might be aggravating the rotator cuff area with all that extreme stretching under heavy load (was he insuating I'm fat?).
I chose the cortisone shot because I didn't want to give up my daily commute ride and hoped this would speed the symptoms away. This is a new tack for me --medicating symptoms instead of focusing purely on root cause. At our age(s), long symptom recovery can degrade quality of life and possibly undo hard won lifestyle habits (like bike commuting).
I had major problems with my rotator cuff area last summer when I decided to see if the "one pull" start on my new mower really worked. Yep, all it took was one pull and I thought my family might have to take me to the emergency room as I was laying in the yard screaming in pain. The pain finally went away but I wasn't able to do anything with that arm for weeks without experiencing pain. I didn't go to the doctor because I was afraid he might want to do something drastic like cut on it
I bought a book on rotator cuff exercises and followed their directions for the next several months. As of this summer, I no longer have any pain associated with using the arm.....haven't tried the mower and probably never will again.
Hopefully the exercises will work for you. I only wish I had gotten some type of medication to lessen the pain during the recovery phase....Tylenol/Advil just didn't work 100%
Fortunately riding the bike didn't seem to bother the shoulder unless I was standing to climb hills.