Featuring Dr. Patrick Chin, MD, MBA, FRCSC, Orthopedic Surgeon

Arthroscopic Shoulder Surgery-Orthopedic Surgery Duration: 2 minutes, 4 seconds

Arthroscopic shoulder surgery is otherwise known as keyhole surgery into the shoulder. 

In the past, or historically, we used to make a large incision in an attempt to gain access into the joint. In the shoulder it is challenging at time for the surgeon to actually see these structures in a tight joint space.

Arthroscopic surgery has enabled us to introduce a fiber optic camera through a two to three millimeter skin incision. That's inserted either into a shoulder joint or above the shoulder joint depending on what we are trying to achieve for that specific patient.  

What that enables us then is to magnify the structures on a TV screen and subsequently enable us to actually perform the procedures in more finer detail per se.  

The surgeries that we perform arthroscopically comes about mainly soft tissue type repairs, for example shoulder instability issues. When a patient traumatically dislocates a shoulder we can now perform the procedure to stabilize the shoulder arthroscopically.

Other types of more common shoulder arthroscopic procedures would be for example a rotator cuff tear where now we can perform the repair of the torn rotator cuff using arthroscopic techniques.

The benefits of arthroscopic shoulder surgery potentially relates to shorter healing time for the patient immediately following the surgery given that it is less invasive, and potentially also starting rehab much earlier following surgery. 

Again, if a patient has any preferences or questions it’s best that they contact their own physician about this.

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Presenter: Dr. Patrick Chin, Orthopaedic Surgeon, Vancouver, BC

Local Practitioners: Orthopaedic Surgeon