Low back pain, NECK PAIN and headaches are the three most common complaints to present to the average chiropractor’s office. Neck pain can be divided into two main categories. Only about ten percent of new patients presenting with neck pain as their chief complaint can identify a traumatic event as causing the problem. Auto accidents causing whiplash is a major cause. Sometimes a neck gets struck by hitting your head on something like the closet shelf or something falls on your head. Riding a roller coaster or even a fall on to your back can cause a neck “whiplash” in the process and can be a minor trauma to the neck. By far the most common factors causing neck pain are non-traumatic; I call it “life”. First you need to understand that the neck is influenced by the muscles that are in your upper back. They start at the lower lever of the shoulder blade (scapula) and attach at various points in your neck up to the base of the scull, the occiput. Some examples of “life” include all those years of 40-hour weeks sitting at a desk/computer work, generalized emotional tension and stress, old injuries producing scar tissue, sleeping on a pillow wrong or simply falling asleep on the end of the couch, the slow onset of neck arthritis and so many more.
Often associated with your neck pain will be headaches and sometimes numbness and tingling in the arm and hands. The above-mentioned situations cause muscle issues which in turn cause vertebral segments (two vertebrae with a disc in-between) of your neck to not function properly which in turn causes the spinal joints to get irritated and inflamed. This irritates the nerves that exit the small foramen (exit holes). Irritated nerves cause pain, numbness and tingling to radiate into the arm and hand. Irritated occipital nerves in the upper neck radiate pain on to the head producing occipital headaches.
Gentle chiropractic spinal manipulation attempts to correct these dysfunctioning or subluxated areas which in turn causes the cervical spine to function better which in-turn relieves the irritated joint pain and nerve irritation. If you have degenerative changes in your neck i.e. arthritis, there is no treatment that will make your arthritis go away or look any different on a follow up x-ray but gentle chiropractic care can often make your arthritis pain feel and function so much better, often significantly reducing your need for OTC medications. Now backing out the car is a lot easier! If NECK PAIN is what’s bothering you, please schedule an appointment with us today.
We’ve been helping neck problem since 1987.