HealthcareHow To Relieve A Chronic Neck Pain?

Working from home during the pandemic has changed our routine, including our working hours and style. One of the detriments of not working in a proper office space is the trouble it can bring to your spine. Many of us have been dealing with neck pain due to the prolonged use of phones and laptops while not maintaining good posture. This, in the long term, can turn neck pain into a chronic condition, which can be challenging to deal with.

Today we are going to address how to relieve chronic neck pain before the problem escalates.

Exercising Regularly

Physical exercise will help with blood flow and muscle movement. Neck exercises are an ideal way to ease muscle tension and an essential aspect of treating neck pain. Ask your doctor to advise you which neck mobility exercises are safe for practice in your level of discomfort. The neck requires movement from time to time. Hence, stretching, moving it from side to side, and aerobic exercise to get the blood flowing to your neck is excellent.

Practice Deep Self Care

Maintaining healthy habits will help you mitigate stress, so consume a nutritious diet, avoid artificial sugar and curb caffeinated beverages that can turn people more agitated and interrupt their sleep. Also, control alcohol smoking since it slows down the healing process by decreasing the blood flow to your neck muscles. If you’ve been feeling stiff lately, check your water intake and drink adequate fluids.

Adopt Relaxing Techniques

Methods and practices that can control and moderate stress include belly breathing, meditation, yoga, and indulging in music or art therapy. Pick one or more hobbies that you can take up during the day to ease up and relax.

Get a Neck and Shoulders Massage

A relaxing massage is a gentle way to reduce stress and chronic neck pain because it improves blood circulation in sore muscles. You can use heat or cold treatments in the massage or use silicone packs to ease the inflammation.

Get a Support System

Developing a healthy support system that one can reach out to when they feel stressed out can curb these emotions from intensifying. Inflammation and pain are often physical indicators of mental distress, so getting the help you need can often save a lot of trouble in the long run. Discussing your problems with trustworthy people can help lower stress. You can even join a therapy session or online support group.

Take Your Treatment for Chronic Anxiety Seriously

Research in the journal BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders stated that psychosocial disorders, especially ones created due to stressful life experiences, are closely related to chronic neck pain. It showed that the tension in most people gathers at their neck and shoulders, mainly due to unconscious behavior like clenching their jaw and tensing muscles. The study tested 448 participants with chronic neck pain and deduced that those with depression and anxiety seemed to have the most significant levels of neck pain, suffered from neck pain longer, and were less likely to pursue recovery actively. If you or a loved one is dealing with stress, anxiety, and depression, it’s necessary to get professional counseling to heal the underlying issues.

Buy a Neck-support Chair

When people hunch and slouch ahead in a forward-head position, they put extra stress on your spine. Maintaining proper posture mindfully keeps the head and spine naturally balanced along the cervical spine and will help lower neck pain. A headrest on your chair can help the cervical spine stay in a neutral posture. You can consider investing in a good-quality office chair with a neck rest to give you relief. Lean the back of your head against the headrest comfortably with the ears away from the shoulders. Also, try to use this headrest on the recliner and car seat too. If you’re working with a computer, make sure to level your eyes evenly with the upper-third of the screen. Also, consider working with a standing desk since standing can help give your spine a natural posture and discourages hunching forwards.

Try Gua Sha Massages

Gua sha involves a trained practitioner using a tool in short strokes down your skin in the painful zones. Gua sha is a type of Chinese Traditional Medicine and is performed on the meridians of the body where blood circulation or your life force (Chi) can get stagnant,  blocking energy.  While there is no scientific proof for Chi (Qi), many have reported relief from chronic neck pain with gua sha. Small research found gua sha to ease neck pain better than heat therapy, but there is a need for more profound analysis.

When attended by a certified and experienced professional, gua sha is generally safe to be performed. This treatment is not to be applied to thinning or damaged skin. Also, since gua sha requires making a series of strokes across your skin, tiny capillaries can break and cause petechiae (red spots) on the skin, which can be misunderstood as a bruise or rash. These quickly clear up in a few days.

Visit a Physical Therapist

It’s general conception to consider physical therapy as a treatment meant for rehabilitation from a severe injury. While this is also true, physical therapy can also be used for your chronic neck pain and provide benefits like:

• Spotting and correcting poor posture or tendencies that contribute to muscle pain and stiffness.
• Learning how to reduce the risk of recurring neck pain.
• Strengthening the muscles of your neck with focused exercises.

Check with your practitioner to check if chronic neck pain can be better treated with physical therapy. Helping better the neck’s strength and mobility can give better support to the spine and mitigate pain. Some studies suggest that physical therapy may provide even greater benefits when teamed up with other treatments like yoga.

Wrapping up:

The healing of chronic neck pain has transformed over time. We know now that the quicker you treat such problems, the faster you can return to your activities.

Researchers have found that the more prolonged chronic neck pain is, the lower are the chances of full recovery. Hence, take action today and start managing stress better by developing a healthier lifestyle. The sooner you get the help that is needed, the faster you will recover.

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