Shoulder pain is not random. The location of your pain and the way your symptoms behave can serve as important diagnostic clues to the underlying problem. By understanding the source of your symptoms, you can take the appropriate steps toward getting an accurate diagnosis and effective treatment. As a sports medicine physician in the San Francisco Bay Area, I have treated thousands of patients with shoulder pain, and the same patterns come up again and again. Certain types of

Medically reviewed by Dr. Jeffrey Peng, MD — Board-Certified Sports Medicine Physician Published: February 26, 2026 | Last Updated: February 26, 2026 If you have been told to just live with calcific tendonitis — or to keep getting cortisone shots until you are "ready for surgery" — you have probably noticed the pain always comes back. That is because most conventional treatments only mask symptoms without addressing the underlying calcium deposit. The good news is there is a