Unknown shoulder injury

[fiveofus]

I am asking on behalf of my 19 year old son. On 2 April he played rugby, the game finished he was fine. The next morning he was in excrutiating pain in his right shoulder and unable to move it at all. He had it xrayed which showed nothing. He has a CT scan which showed a haematoma but otherwise nothing to explain the extreme pain or lack of ability to use his arm. He is booked to see a specialist (27 May) and hopefully get an MRI scan but in the mean time the physio has said he has never seen something like this before and does not really know what to do.
He can bend and use his arm below the elbow, when he attempts to lift his arm from the shoulder in any direction there is absolutely no movement, he can not physically do it almost as though the message is not getting through from the brain. It is constantly painful. A cortisone was suggested but ruled out due to the haematoma. He can shrug his shoulder but in no way lift his arm. The physio had him lying down yesterday and asked him to lift his arm and was dumbfounded when he quite literally got no movement at all. He stated he had not seen something like this before and was unsure what to do.
The only way he can do anything with his arm is by lifting it with his other hand.
He has a pulley to hold and lift one arm with the other to stretch it out which he can do but it is excrutiating.
Have you encountered anything like this before?

[Heidi]

Not personally no. I would say it is pretty rare.
Generally there are two reasons why someone may not be able to move a body part. Either:

There is a muscle(s) rupture or
Nerve damage

Has his neck been investigated? The neck should always be checked with shoulder injuries as they are so closely linked.