Left shoulder pain after eating or drinking

I have recently developed this symptom is well. Roughly 15 minutes after I eat I developed a severe pain in my left shoulder that creeps up to my neck. It doesn’t seem to happen when I eat in the morning or at lunch almost exclusively in the evening. It is also not exacerbated by any movement although a deep breath can make the pain more intense. We eat fairly healthy at our house but I am prone to eating too much. I’m 38 years old and I exercise 4 to 6 times per week. I’m trying to get back to see my G.I. doc soon but I would love to have someone of a hunch going in

I’ve had this several times and it’s annoying!! And it hurts! I think it’s a few things possibly but I don’t know for sure, strained tendons in the neck, pinched nerve, or something displaced. Again I’m not too sure of the cause but I get mine when I wake up sometimes or sometimes when I eat, but you’re not alone with this, have you figured it out yet??

I’m having a CT scan and blood work done with my GI doc. Neck pain after eating is hard to conceptualize whether it’s caused by the stomach or something else but we’re starting with the GI point of view. I’ll hope to follow up with the outcome. I suspect these tests will bring as many questions as answers but we’ll see.

@ryhughes

Several members have mentioned this problem. If you care to share more, how long have you had this problem? Any other symptoms that accompany it?

I hope that you get some answers as a result of the CT scan and blood work. If you would like to post an update after you get your results, that would be great.

Teresa

I know this is an older topic, but I have experienced a lot of these symptoms. Doctors are also stumped. I don't get pain down the arm, but I do get pain in and around the left shoulder blade after eating, mostly grains, high fiber food. I don't have reflux or GERD either. I do get esophageal spasms while eating cottage cheese and yogurt, but not any other cold foods or drinks. The only physician who has come up with anything is the ER doc who sent me for an MRI of my thoracic spine, which showed herniated thoracic discs touching the cord.

I also get migraine flare-ups and the doctor said the same HNPs could be causing referred pain that is triggering the migraines because quite often there is the same shoulder pain associated with migraine.

@debkl Hi, there! Please do not be offended. I am neither kidding nor trying to play a doctor on TV. But these symptoms I have, with a bunch of others, and I know what causes mine. Maybe it will give some clues. To start off, I would bet that you have some form of a systemic disease of mis-folding proteins these precursors of trouble are called prions. made in the liver, and distributed around the body in the blood. It is inherited from either parent. They live a couple hours, clone themselves a time or two, then die, then deposit their carcases wherever they can fit in the body. There are nearly 2000 formats of this process, including Lupus, Alzheimers, Crohns, LECT2..... Anyway, One that latches on to the shoulder tissues eventually is called Gelsolin. That is mine. It is also called Merotoja's Disease or Finnish Amyloidosis. As each of these dead prions, attaches itself, it attracts others, then forms little tubes filled with water and other stuff. Eventually this deposit damages the ability of the tissue to carry out its functions, whether it is nerve, muscle, fat, skin, bone, tooth, eye, whatever. And it is always fatal after a while. Gelsolin grows very slowly, often not being detected before age 70. It can be detected fairly readily then with a simple assay, SERUM Free Lite Chain (c)BindingsSite(Birmingham UK and Seattle). It measures the Kappa and Lambda proteins in miligrams per serum deciliter (NOT PLASMA!). Mine is about 3.0 mG/dL Your local doctor can order it, but it must be sent to one of the national quality labs for analysis, such as ARUP in Salt Lake City; Quant (Mayo-MN), or Boston Gen. There is a lot more info available at many sites. Amyloidosis.org. Alnylam.com Cleveland Clinic NIH.gov, etc. https://bit.Ly/1w7j4j8 "Amyloid and Old Karl"

Hmm, thank you. Never heard of it, but I will look into it and bring it up at my PE next month.

Confusing problem. I assume you have had a cardiac work-up. Nerves from area under diaphragm can cause pain on the left upper part of the body, such as reflux or from a vascular problem.

Yes, after going to ER twice thinking it was cardiac (my father had back pain that turned out to be cardiac), I had a cardiac work-up, plus ortho, and gastro.

Hi, I found this thread about half hour ago while googling the same question. I've been reading many of the replies.
Sadly I'm one of the masses on this thread who suffers the painful left shoulder after eating.

There has to be something official this is called though, because so many of us share those exact same three symptoms;

* Shoulder pain,
* We all have said "Left" shoulder,
* After eating.

Being stuck at home all day in a wheelchair, I get really bored, so I might create something that can enter health/pain details many have posted and see if I can find a trigger for this.