Neck Pain
Most people get neck pain at some point in their lives. Most neck pain is not serious in nature, due to tight, tired or spasmy muscles or stiffness in joints, but some neck pain can be more severe and disabling like whiplash injuries or pain due to discs, nerves or wear and tear in joints. Pain related to the neck can be felt anywhere from the upper shoulder or shoulder blade to the back or even top of your head. Most mild neck pain will make you sore on certain movements or in a certain position that you hold your in head in.
So what are the main causes of neck pain and how can we help you?
Muscle tightness or spasm
Where are the symptoms and what does it feel like?
This is when you feel pain or tightness usually along one side of your neck, though sometimes both sides, which may refer into your shoulder or your upper back. Sometimes this pain can be really intense or sometimes just an annoying ache. The pain is usually worse when you bring your chin to your chest or look over your opposite shoulder. Sometimes you can get a headache with it as the tight muscles attach into the base of the skull and can cause a tension-type headache.
How does it happen?
Neck muscles can get tight or spasmy from being in postures that load your neck for long periods of time, like sitting at your desk for a long time for work or study, driving, working on activities overhead, watching tv or playing videos games. Sometimes this pain can be brought on by sleeping awkwardly leaving you to wake with a stiff and sore neck.
What is it stopping you from doing?
It’s usually sore and stiff to move your neck, particularly when you turn your neck, so it can affect work and sports or any activity where you have to look over the shoulder. It can also affect reading or any activities where you look down like using the laptop or phone.
How can we get you better?
This type of pain responds really well to physiotherapy treatments like soft tissue massage, gentle stretching as well as exercises to relax and loosen the muscles. Heat also helps. We’ll advise you on positions and postures to avoid and, more importantly, to adopt. Sometimes sitting for too long in the same position is as important as how you actually sit as tension builds over time.
Disc or Joint-related neck pain
Where are the symptoms and what does it feel like?
If your pain is more specific in location and associated with restriction of movement to the side of the pain or when looking upwards it MAY be due to an arthritic, stiff or catching joint on that side of your neck. If the pain is quite specific in location and worsened by looking down or to the side it MAY be due to a disc irritation or joint injury.
How does it happen?
These symptoms may be due to changes to the disc and joints in the cervical spine. These changes are normal with aging ( even over the age of 35!) and even if wear and tear in the discs and joints are found on Xray or scan this does not mean necessarily that you will get neck pain. Other than age-related changes, sometimes joint or discs can get damaged or irritated over time due to postures causing excessive loading on the structures or due to excessive force from a quick or sharp movement while doing manual work or playing sports.
What is it stopping you from doing?
The pain will be worse on the specific movements detailed above though can also be painful in resting positions (especially if the neck is in a lying/sitting in a position loading the disc or joint).
How can we get you better?
Again this type of issue responds really well to physiotherapy treatments like joint mobilisations as well as soft tissue massage. We will advise you on activities and positions to avoid and adopt and exercises to do to improve the condition of the affected joint, disc or spinal segment.
Nerve pain referred from the neck
Where are the symptoms and what does it feel like?
When the nerves coming out of the neck get irritated you might get pain or other symptoms like weakness or pins and needles into your arm and even into your fingers.
How does it happen?
This pain occurs when a nerve is impinged or compressed as it leaves the spinal canal in the neck due to for example a disc pressing onto it or when the space that it exits the neck becomes too narrow.
What is it stopping you from doing?
This type of pain can be quite debilitating. Patients describe it like a toothache in their arm. It can cause a constant discomfort which can be very distracting and it can affect sleep. It can also sharp pain on certain movements which will limit you doing those activities that cause pain on those movements.
How can we get you better?
We will look to treat the source of the nerve impingement with joint and nerve mobilisations, massage or gentle stretches. We will also give you advice and exercises to improve the disc, joint and nerve condition to try and stop it coming back in the future.
Whiplash
Where are the symptoms and what does it feel like?
Whiplash is a term used to describe a set of injuries when the neck is forced quickly back and forth quickly, for example in a car accident. The symptoms associated with whiplash are varied as injury can occur to multiple structures at the same time, including joints, discs, ligaments, muscles, and nerves. Symptoms include stiffness, neck pain, arm pain, headaches, weakness and sometimes other symptoms such as dizziness or post traumatic stress. The symptoms can start immediately after the accident but or sometimes several days later.
How does it happen?
Whiplash-related injury and pain results from a car accident or sports injury where there is a sudden forceful movement of your head and neck forwards and or side to side. Different structures can get over-stretched and strained and you often get protective muscle spasm which can cause pain and stiffness.
What is it stopping you from doing?
It affects lots of day to day activities as your neck may feel locked up and there may be pain on several different movements. You may have trouble getting comfortable to sleep.
How can we get you better?
Its really important that you get advice quickly on the do’s and dont’s before the symptoms gets worse. We’ll guide you on correct postures and movements to adopt aswell as safe stretches and exercises to help the symptoms resolve and to get the neck structures to heal and strengthen. Manual therapy like massage and gentle joint mobilisations can be really effective in reducing pain and promoting healing. Heat treatments can be soothing for muscle spasm.
Headaches caused by your neck
Sometimes headaches can be caused by your neck. This can be caused by a build up of tension in the neck muscles that attach to the base of the skull (tension headaches) or from stiffness in the joints at the top of your neck (cervicogenic headache). See our headache section for more details on different types of headaches and how to deal with them.