Cerebral Activation and Apprehension in Patients With Shoulder Instability.

In a similar study, the investigators demonstrated that shoulder stabilization could allow the brain to partially "recover". Patients with shoulder apprehension underwent clinical and fMRI examination before and one year after shoulder stabilization surgery. Clinical examination showed a significant improvement in postoperative shoulder function compared with preoperative. Coherently, results showed a decreased activation in the left pre-motor cortex postoperatively, demonstrating that stabilization surgery induced improvements both at the physical and at the brain levels, one year postoperatively. Most interestingly, right-frontal pole and right-occipital cortex activity was associated with good outcome in shoulder performance.