"Shoulder Dislocation"

I have now been waiting for an MRI for 13 months. I dislocated my shoulder in May 2024 and went to A&E where I was not given anything other than a brief look over and given a cream and sent on my way. The shoulder, as one would imagine, did not recover from this injury. To begin I was unable to move my arm very much at all, and while I have got some strength and mobility back myself, I am still in pain a year and a half later, and it’s only getting worse.

This is affecting my daily life, my mental health and my sporting career. I am an international athlete, competing at the highest level of my sport representing the country and I can’t imagine I will get selected next year if I am unable to get past this injury. It feels completely unfair, as others my age have got an MRI in a much shorter time frame for their sporting injuries. This should be my prime years for my sport but due to what I feel is a lack of care, I might end up losing out on opportunities that I have worked for, for the past few years. If I could afford to go private I would, but I can’t afford it, and the longer this goes on the more pain my shoulder is in.

I’ve been in and out of the GP asking for help and to 4 separate physios, but no one can actually figure out what’s wrong with the shoulder because it needs an MRI to figure out and so each time they guess a new thing and give me more exercise that don’t help the shoulder. It’s really exhausting, and draining been pushed back and forth between different people all with different opinions when they themselves have said an MRI would give us the information, it’s just really dehumanising to be told we can help you and it’s a really simple solution just an MRI but you have to be put on this long list and you won’t hear back from us again so good luck, because we don’t know what’s wrong with it.