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Neck Pain & Headache Treatments

My profession is my passion. Over the years, now it seems endless amount of times, studying and working only increased my inspirations about it. The more I knew, the more I wanted to know.

Neck pain is one of the most common problems that even the healthiest of us suffer from. This made me investigate neck pain and treatments deeper in my physiotherapy practice in Carlingford & West Pennant Hills. I found out that neck had an enormous amount of functions to handle; consequently, when things went wrong, we would be in trouble.

It consists of the top part of our spine (cervical spine), with several muscles, few larger and several of smaller ligaments around it. Our neck is comprised of seven vertebrae joined together by facet joints. The discs cushion the vertebrae in between. Joint capsules and ligaments keep them together. This makes the neck very strong.

A very important function of our neck is to be a safe and secure home for the spinal cord that runs through. Spinal nerves branch out before and after each vertebral level from their own little canals to reach out to our arms and some internal organs near to facet joints.

Facet joints are located at the back of the neck because of that they are quite vulnerable against injuries and wear and tear due to their location and function. The health of these joints is closely related to the strength and flexibility of the muscles and ligaments that attach to them. Primarily these muscles, ligament and discs support our neck against the gravity, repetitive and prolonged movement and jarring that happen every day and night.

Studies have shown that problems originating from these joints caused the common pain patterns that we see almost every day in and around neck. This may mean that most neck pains and stiffness are caused by the wear and tear and injuries that happen in these joints.

Depending on level of injury, symptoms may be neck pain and stiffness, headache, reduced concentration, vision problems, light-headedness (according to the International Headache Society), balance problems, shoulder and/or arm pain and pins and needles and numbness in the arm and hands, weakness in severe conditions.

Treating neck problems and headache

Most neck problems occur due to the weakness in the muscles that we develop for various reasons such as sedentary life style, aging or an injury and so on. If not treated this eventually would cause the stiffness in the facet joints that would lead all the trouble in the neck.

Good news is that this can be treated with proper interventions. Move Well Physiotherapy has its own way of utilising manual therapy to initiate the healing to recover joint mobility and function and exercises to maintain it. You can find more information about this in my online book Stop Headache Neck Pain Bad Posture through Amazon.

In Move Well Physiotherapy (Carlingford & West Pennant Hills), I have designed and patented two exercising tools to specifically target and exercise muscles controlling and coordinating neck and head.

Rotator Band

Rotator Band is designed and patented by Move Well Physiotherapy to exercise rotator muscles of the neck (with/or without any other movement) resistively.  The resistance can be increased progressively.

One of the unique features of the band is the pull goes all around the head.

This provides the possibility of resisting the movement at any degree of the whole range of movement. This also includes the neutral. This means patients can still exercise with the tool although they are in pain and ease it.

Resistance helmet

Resistance Helmet is the second tool that belongs to Move Well Physiotherapy. It has six bags weighing 300g each. This provides the possibility of increasing or decreasing the amount of resistance to suit the patients’ ability level. They are also able to increase the number of bags as they get stronger in time.

It is suitable for strengthening the flexion, extension, lateral flexion in side laying and deep neck stabilisers of your neck.