Rotator cuff, and other shoulder-related, traction relief

Apparatus for addressing shoulder issues including each of (a) a subject's rotator cuff tear, and (b) a subject's post-shoulder-surgery condition comprising, at least,

• a subject-wearable, passive, elongate, yieldable-resistance, force-applying device possessing opposite ends, and between said ends a line of action which, with the apparatus in place relative to such a subject and to the subject's rotator cuff/condition, lies generally parallel to the long axis of the subject's associated humerus, and
• structure associated with said opposite ends for anchoring those ends operatively to spaced points on the subject's anatomy in a manner whereby the force-applying device applies to the anatomy a force which tends to produce separation between the head of the humerus and the rotator cuff.

A method of relieving compression pressure on the shoulder region which includes a rotator cuff including the steps of

• applying to the upper arm which is associated with that cuff a gravity-independent, effective traction force,
• maintaining that force for a user-selected time interval, and
• by such force application, and during the user-selected time interval, decompressing the shoulder region which includes the rotator cuff in a direction which is essentially along the long axis of the upper arm.