Prevent

Shoulder arthritis causes a deep ache, stiffness, grinding and night pain. Most people start with exercise and pain relief, and replacement comes up when pain wrecks sleep and daily life, with the type depending on whether your rotator cuff still works.

A pinched nerve in the neck usually improves without surgery, often within weeks, and most people are much better within a few months. Clumsy hands, trouble with balance or problems with your bladder are different and need urgent care.

Hip arthritis usually causes groin or thigh pain and stiffness, like trouble putting on socks. Exercise, education and weight management come first; hip replacement makes sense when pain and stiffness are limiting your life despite doing those well.

A cortisone shot usually starts working within a few days to a week, and the relief lasts anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. Use that pain-free window to exercise, because the shot calms pain but doesn’t fix the cause.

Most cortisone shot side effects are short-lived: a day or few of extra pain, a flushed face, or higher blood sugar if you have diabetes. Infection is rare but urgent, and repeated shots carry more risk, so most people are limited to about three a year.

Spinal stenosis causes leg pain, heaviness or numbness when you walk or stand that eases when you sit or lean forward. Most people don’t need surgery straight away: in a major trial, a physio program did about as well as surgery at two years, with fewer complications.

Most hip labral tears are treated with physio first, and many people with a tear on MRI have no pain at all. Hip arthroscopy can help some younger people with hip impingement, but the benefit over physio is modest, and it works poorly if you already have arthritis.

Hip bursitis, now usually called greater trochanteric pain syndrome, is mostly a problem with the gluteal tendons on the side of the hip. Education plus a progressive exercise program works better over a year than a cortisone shot or waiting it out.

Most sciatica from a slipped disc gets better on its own within a few weeks to a few months, and the disc often shrinks back as it heals. Staying active helps, bed rest doesn’t, and a few rare symptoms mean you need hospital care the same day.

A meniscus tear’s treatment depends on how it happened. Wear-and-tear tears over 40 usually do as well with exercise as with surgery. Injury tears that lock the knee may need repair. Symptoms, MRI results in context, and recovery times.