Chicago, Ill. (June 3, 2010) – Major League Baseball (MLB) is losing too many pitchers to shoulder injuries…so team owners have turned to a Rush University researcher for a solution.
MLB has awarded Dr. Anthony Romeo a $50,000 grant to determine if his pioneering operation can prolong pitchers’ careers without slowing down their 90 mile-per-hour fastballs. Jerry Reinsdorf and Bud Selig will personally visit the orthopedic surgeon’s lab next month to review his progress.
Kerry Wood, Mark Prior Angel Guzman, Pedro Martinez and countless other major league pitchers have suffered “torn labrum” injuries. “This is far and away the most common career-ending pitching injury,” says Dr. Romeo. The orthopedic surgeon heads the Shoulder Service at Rush Medical College and is the Team Physician for the Chicago White Sox.
The labrum, the fibrous outer rim of the shoulder socket, stabilizes the head of the upper arm. However, the repeated strain of major league pitching often tears the labrum. The most common tear, called a SLAP tear, causes severe pain, a loss of stamina, and a loss of velocity.
If six weeks of rest doesn’t help, the standard major league operation is a “SLAP repair.” The surgeon reattaches the labrum to the shoulder socket using sutures.
There’s only one problem: the operation often doesn’t work. “One-third of players still have shoulder pain after their operations,” says Dr. Romeo. “Others never get back their fastball or endurance.”
The dilemma has long frustrated both MLB owners and orthopedic surgeons. But Dr. Romeo may have a solution.
The orthopedic surgeon believes “a labral tear almost always also involves the biceps tendon. That tendon also needs to be repaired or pitchers will still have pain.”
For that reason Dr. Romeo routinely combines a traditional labral repair with a separate biceps repair. The surgeon repositions the biceps outside the crowded shoulder joint where the tendon can heal itself. The pioneering approach has worked for college pitchers but major league managers remain cautious.
“They’re concerned moving the biceps will affect a major league fast ball,” says Dr. Romeo. “But now they’ve lost so many pitchers they’ve given us a grant to find out.”
Researchers are now studying precisely how Dr. Romeo’s approach affects the shoulder’s biomechanics. Surgeons will arthroscopically operate on 36 cadaver shoulder joints. After each procedure, they’ll measure the joint’s range of motion, stability, rotation, and stability. The goal is to compare the biomechanical effects of doing a labral repair with and without performing a biceps repair as well.
“If we find out those biomechanics don’t change,” says Dr. Romeo, “reassured league owners could make operating on the biceps a standard addition to common labral surgery. That’ll end decades of standard treatment and that’s why the owners are so interested in this study.”
“What’s at stake,” he continues, “are the current and future careers of many major league pitchers in their 30’s and 40’s.”
###
