Shoulder pain rehab is a joke in Taipei.

Life Health & Fitness
1

First the back story:
Hurt my shoulder, took some time off from the gym - pain still didn’t go away for 2 weeks.

So lets go to the hospital - Taipei Hospital, Fuyou Branch (Heping) … I’m reading this off my meds.
First diagnose - consisted of sitting in achair next to the doctor who asked some generic questions, as I tried to demonstrate my mobility issue. She says “shoulder is very complicated area of the body.”
Ok, I am not being critical at this point. Just smiled and agreed. She kinda dug her fingers into different areas of my shoulder ( I was wearing a sleavless shirt)… I guess expecting me to jump to floor in pain. Didn’t happen, “Pain must be deep in your shoulder.”

I am given 3 scripts for anti-inflammatory pills, and a muscle relaxer that I had to sign a waiver for.

The pills worked so-SO, the pain subsided but was essentially a bandaid for the problem. They really dulled my appetite. Which sucks if you are not going to the gym - loss of gainz, easily.

Also apart of the rehab was coming back to the hospital for physical rehab. This is the reason for my post:

I was easily the youngest person in the huge room filled of octogenarians. A cattle room of beds and chairs and seperate rooms depending what your ailment was. There was no workout equipment - I was expecting at the worst somebody showing me how to flop around on a bench press doing rotary cuff raises with a 1lb DB. This was worst service than that:

Surrounded by old people… brought into a back room, where they put a machine on my shoulder that was essentially a overpriced hairdryer to heat up my shoulder… it was never hot enough or did much.
I asked them to adjust twice… but by the time it was rising in heat, “treatment was over”.
Total time: 15 minutes.

Moved to Electric shock treatment next, Really.
4 suction cups later, and I feel like a cow being milked, so I asked them to up the ante, and this time they did comply. Felt neat, and watching my shoulder twitch.
Total treatment: 15 minutes.


3 days later the bruise is still there.

So I guess now, maybe someone will diagnose my mobility and ask questions like can you move your arm in this direction, can you do this, does it hurt here or here. Right?

Nope, " Bye, have a nice day."

So now I am watching youtube videos and trying to diagnose my own shoulder mobility issues and hoping its not a tear.
I am debating if I should go back for a MRI, as I dont know what the result will be for that. But I am leaning towards it, because atleast its a machine and they cant possibly F’ that up can they?
I really miss the gym.

Today it started to dawn on me… and why so many people were in here. Now granted, I understand not having allot of money and unable to work probably at old age completely.
But this is the issue: The cost for this treatment was 50NT: $1.50 now compare that to even a low class massage place for $300NT you can see why this place is wall to wall people. These people consider it a spa alternative, and the quality of the service will just continue to be low.
Disappointed.

2

That sucks.
In my experience health care in Taiwan is a lot of “hit & miss”. When I had a bicycle accident and went to the doctor with some discomfort near the shoulder-arm joint, he quickly pointed out there might have been a crack in the bone: an x-ray and in 5 minutes we noticed that there was indeed a small crack (not big enough to feel like a completely broken arm, but noticeable enough to feel discomfort) and in 10/14 days of medications and rehab I was fine.
My lower back though has been A PAIN. I’ve had an injury when I was a teenager (two cracked vertebrae), then torn a ligament in the same area in 2010. Ever since I was born, my left leg has always been slightly shorter than the right one, something that my therapist in my home country helped me to fix with shoe inserts. Here in Taiwan< EVERY-SINGLE-DOCTOR ignored the difference in leg length. I went through laser therapy, heat therapy, massages, hot packs for years with next to no improvement. Then one day I basically thought:“Screw this” and put an extra insert in my left shoe because I had the feeling my current insert got a bit usured over time and lost some height. 0 back pain for almost 1 year.
Luckily I have the health insurance and all the therapy I did here in Taiwan cost me almost nothing, but holy cow the amount of wasted time. If only ONE doctor took the time to check the length of my legs, I’d have probably saved 200+ hours that I could have invested watching anime online.

1 Like
3

I’ve been to one or two of these clinics or spas for my knee and had very very similar experience as you. First visit consisted of the doctor just checking up and pressing some pressure points, giving you meds and making you go into the physical therapy room.

After about 10-12 sessions of heated machine and the suction cups, I had about enough of it. The sessions weren’t helping. However, the physical therapists were all pretty helpful in telling me, I had a weaker right leg than my left (and also very weak core muscles) in order to compensate, I was using a lot of my left leg, which in order got injured.

After my heat machine and suction cups, they would come over to stretch me and give me a quick 5-10 min massage. They also taught me some basic ways to stretch before and after exercising.

I tried out the warm up/cool down and stretch a few times, but the itchy feeling was still there. I ended up going to the Chinese medicinal route and got cupping done a few times a week. Later found out cupping wasn’t a long term solution and stopped paying 400NT a session.

In the end, it was some yoga, stretching before and after exercising and a monthly visit to the Thai massage place that got the itchy feeling in my knee to go away. Not very happy that I spent so much time and money at all the doctor’s. That’s just how it is though.

4

I dont get it. It was 50nt with insurance or?

5

With National Health Insurance (card), it’s 50NT a session at most PT clinics.

6

Most physical rehab is a joke in Taiwan, especially if it’s the ones covered by NHI. It’s mostly placebo for old people to have something to do and feel better. You’ll need to spend out of pocket to see a real specialist to get any real help, especially if you’re a athlete vs a normal every day person.

7

Honestly, with any “hardware”-issue like that, acupuncture can be amazing. However, the same “hit-and-miss” principle applies here. Best if you know somebody who can recommend a good doctor for you.

8

Most initial treatment on the NHI is a joke, precisely because most people have little to nothing wrong with them. Bag of smarties and out the door, everyone is happy, except for the person who actually needs a doctor.

If you feel the doctor is semi-competent then go back a couple of days later and let them know the pills/stretches whatever are not working, rinse and repeat until they realise that a) you have a real problem and b) you’re not going away. Second option is to get a private doctor to do the initial check and recommend a diagnosis method or treatment, take this information to your NHI doc and have them do it.

I suffered from a stomach issue for more than a year in Taiwan almost 2 years in fact, going to various doctors and getting the same smarties which didn’t help. During a trip home I called into a local GP and described the issue, straight away he felt he knew what was wrong and prescribed medicine, 3 days later I was a new man. Go back to Taiwan and back to the specialist gastroenterologist I had been seeing for the last 6 months and showed him the pills which worked to which he replied, oh they would work alright but I can’t prescribe them on the NHI without performing an endoscopy first! Had the endoscopy and he prescribed the drugs, turns out you have to do an endoscopy every 3 months in order to keep getting the drugs…gave up and just bought them over the counter in the local pharmacy. Nearly 2 years of misery just because of some BS rule that discourages doctors from prescribing proper medication. If you find yourself getting the run around another option is to tell the doc that you are OK with “zi fei”, i.e. you’ll pay for the proper drugs yourself.

9

Hey DA,

Check this out for some great shoulder mobility drills (and a whole body program, literally head to toes) here:

Beginner:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1aLdYgfr3M&list=PLFB458458F14ED867

Intermediate:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcjwEFjpNj0&list=PL2F820643A63A9D0D

Seriously worth checking out, helped me rehab my shoulder after a nasty full dislocation.

10

The problem Is they don’t ask enough questions and take a history. Similar thing happened to me for another ailment,

11

Actually the first one was free, my girl told me that the next visit would be 50 NT.
Yes I have medical coverage here in Taiwan, ARC.

12

Co-worker recommended that as well, but then I heard the treatment is for 2 months of acupuncture.
Nobody got time for that, sounded like my previous experience with a chiropractor back home I suspected of him wanting me to basically pay his green fees at the local public golf course all summer.

13

Wow, this new web design is cancer like I said in that previous thread of mine.
replying to comments and all you see is a round little bubble to express that.
Honestly was this a free wordpress template?

14

Thanks, I’ll try this.
My pain is not very severe, but just the fact that I dont know if I am on the cusp of snapping my 'ish up, troubles me.
Do I go back to the gym and just deal with it, or will I instantly punch my ticket to snapcity on a Overhead Press.

Hell, I cant even pinpoint exactly where the pain is, but know certain movements do hurt. Lastly, I dont know if stretching will help or harm at this point. Or just waiting it out… and for how long… or is that going to end up making it worst: doing nothing.

15

I cannot comment on Taiwan hospitals but I have a similar issue with my shoulder/neck and am seeing an osteopath. It has been diagnosed as a trapped nerve in the neck… I’ve had some pulling and pushing type treatment (I think the medical term is ‘realignment’) and some exercises. It coincides with loss of strength of my bicep which means no gym.

Not sure if this helps but I thought it was a bicep tear but should be able to tell from bicep shape. Seems the remedy is rest and stretching.

16

Exacly, and it’s something that I notice even when my wife goes to the doctor. Everything is:“Oh it’s an allergy”.

17

Common Chinese diagnosis for any ailment:

  • “Change of weather”
  • “You are too hot/cold*”
  • “Build up of toxins” (a new one on me but heard last night as the reason for cupping.
  • 'Apartment has bad feng shui"
  • delete as applicanle
18

Not sure who told you that, the doctor? Back when I repeatedly dislocated my shoulder I would get terrible pain from inflammation and haematomata. After one to two visits at a good Chinese doctor, including acupuncture and “tuina” (‘massage’, but one that will hurt a lot), the pain was usually gone.

So while you need not expect immediate miracles from acupuncture, I am sure most similar ailments can be helped within a short timeframe. If they tell you to come more often, it is probably because they want to make sure to not just cure the symptoms, but actually help you solve the problem. If it’s a good place that is.

In general it is not true that a treatment takes two months. For me and my shoulder / back pains, it helped almost immediately. However, ONLY at the right place (can’t repeat this too often).

I know of a good doctor in Kaohsiung, sadly none in Taipei.

1 Like
19

I am a TCM doctor, a.k.a. acupuncturist, who practice in Taipei, come see me!

1 Like
20

LOL.

Come on… somebody with shoulder problems, and a few tweaks in the Qi is going to solve the muscular and perhaps bones problems…