Tips From Our Wellness Center on How To Prevent Neck Pain

We treat people with mild to severe neck pain in our wellness center.  The pain is typically caused by an injury like a car accident, slip and fall, workplace accident or sports injury.  With ongoing chiropractic care, we can help to significantly reduce or eliminate the pain.

In addition to visiting our office, here are steps you can take to prevent neck pain at home.

• Stretch.  We can show you stretches that are safe for your neck and back.  By stretching on a daily basis, you can help to loosen your muscles and eliminate some of the tension that you may be feeling.   Just be careful to stretch as directed so that you don’t accidentally pull something.
• Use a cervical pillow.  You can wake up feeling refreshed instead of having neck pain, simply by switching out your regular pillow for a cervical one.  This type of pillow is designed to promote a healthy curve in your neck.  By supporting the space under the head and neck, you won’t wake up with any stiff areas.  We can demonstrate how this works in our wellness center, but it is perhaps one of the easiest things you can do to feel better because there is virtually no effort required.
• Sleep on your back.  This is the best position to sleep in for a healthy back and neck.  If it is uncomfortable for you, try to start out this way even if you move throughout the night.
• Use a headset.  If you talk on the phone a lot, you may experience more neck pain while trying to hold the phone in place and do other activities.  Use a headset for your cell phone and work phone so that you can move around and speak comfortably without hurting your neck.
• Keep things at eye level.  When reading or working on your computer, keep things at eye level so that your head can remain in a natural position instead of being held at an angle.
• Practice good posture.  Sit and stand up straight.  Good posture will help your back and neck to stay in alignment and reduce any neck pain that you may be feeling.
• Stop carrying a heavy purse.  If one side of you is weighted down with a giant purse that contains everything under the sun, stop tempting yourself.  Switch to a simple pocket size purse instead.  This way you will carry your essentials only and leave the heavy bag at home.  By preventing one side of your body from being weighed down, you can prevent shoulder and neck pain.
• Drink water.  It is important to stay hydrated throughout the day.  Your body needs water in order to stay healthy, and your spine does too.  The discs between your vertebrae contain water so by staying hydrated your spine can feel better as well.

We understand that neck pain can make it difficult to do many daily activities. You don’t have to live with pain and if you are, schedule an appointment with our wellness center so that we can help you to start feeling better.