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Neck Pain Cure
A neck pain cure is not a pill, surgery, or an injection. A neck pain cure is a comprehensive treatment strategy. The first step in this neck pain cure is determining the way in which the neck pain came about in the first place. Treatment of a pinched nerve in the neck is different than a bone fracture is different than a whiplash injury-all of these cause neck pain. Of course serious neck injuries require immediate, expert medical attention, but chronic neck pain usually boils down to two main culprits: whiplash and nonspecific pain. In both cases, the muscles, tendons, and ligaments are the source of the pain. Fortunately, these biological structures are also the keys to a neck pain cure.
Acute vs. chronic neck pain
Acute injuries are those that occur in a single, easily identifiable moment. You get in a car accident and your neck whips about quickly, for example. Chronic neck pain has no single cause or, if there is a single cause, it occurring a long time ago and the pain has not gone away (or returns periodically). While an acute, non-serious neck injury can initially be treated with relative rest and ice to reduce the inflammation and pain, most neck pain is of the chronic variety. In chronic neck pain, relative rest and ice are not indicated. For the purposes of this discussion a neck pain cure refers to a cure for chronic neck pain.
No pain, no improvement
People tend to avoid pain when they can. Someone that experiences constant neck pain tends to rest the neck as much as possible in an attempt to avoid the neck pain. This usually means that the head is kept in the same position and the neck muscles are "rested" as much as possible. Sadly, this is not helpful. A neck pain cure requires that you have the strength of will to work through the pain. While no one would advocate exercising during severe neck pain; mild neck pain during neck pain exercises is part of most physical therapy treatment programs. If you can tolerate analgesics, the occasional use of acetaminophen or ibuprofen can take the edge off of mild neck pain. These medicines should be used to ease neck pain exercises, not as a standalone therapy. A neck that is not exercising is generally not moving any closer to a neck pain cure.
Building strength
Once you can find a tolerable amount of pain, it is best to perform neck pain exercises that increase the muscles' strength. Out of all the tools available to a physical therapist, the ones that come closest to a neck pain cure are strength and endurance training for the neck. Of course the type of exercise will depend on the mechanism of injury (what caused the pain), but they all attempt to achieve the same goal: make the neck muscles stronger and the neck ligaments and tendons more resilient. How do you make the neck stronger? The same way you make any muscle stronger, by subjecting it to repeated exercises against resistance. Exercise physiologists call the approach progressive resistance exercises, but they are no different than gentle weight training for your neck.
Use drugs or surgery with caution
Some people believe that a true neck pain cure can only come from drugs, injections, or surgery. In select cases this is true. When the pain is confirmed to be coming from the muscle, certain muscle relaxants can help. When the joints of the neck (the cervical spine) are inflamed or arthritic, steroid injections into the joint may be a temporary neck pain cure. Unfortunately these approaches may cure neck pain when the pain is due to a serious, clearly indentified cause. Sadly, most chronic neck pain is not effectively treated with a pill or a shot. In most cases, effective treatment involves a well-designed, supervised regimen of strength and endurance exercises at its core. This also means that a neck pain cure requires some hard work and, yes, a little bit of pain.
neck pain cure references
Benyamin RM, Singh V, Parr AT, Conn A, Diwan S, Abdi S. Systematic review of the effectiveness of cervical epidurals in the management of chronic neck pain. Pain Physician 2009;12:137-157.
Ebell MH. Exercises for mechanical neck disorders. Am Fam Physician 2006;74:1126.
See S, Ginzburg R. Choosing a skeletal muscle relaxant. Am Fam Physician 2008;78:365-370.
Taylor NF, Dodd KJ, Damiano DL. Progressive resistance exercise in physical therapy: a summary of systematic reviews. Phys Ther 2005;85:1208-1223.
Ylinen J. Physical exercises and functional rehabilitation for the management of chronic neck pain. Eura Medicophys 2007;43:119-132.
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