Hi my name is Dr. Andrea Furlan I am a physiatrist in Toronto Canada and today
I'm going to demonstrate some exercises for the neck that I learned with my
mentor Dr. Satiko Imamura a physiatrist in Brazil where I did my
residency program and she taught me this more than 25 years ago and I learned and
I teach many of my patients who have myofascial pain of the neck muscles
myofascial pain I did another video that you can go and learn what is myofascial pain
but basically it's trigger points inside of the muscles. This exercises are very
helpful for muscles in the front of the neck such as the sternocleidomastoid
muscles also the side of the neck like the scalenes muscles and the back of the
neck like the trapezius muscles and all the tiny little muscles on the posterior
aspect of the cervical spine, so the first thing that we do for this exercise
is finding a chair or somewhere that we can hold here because we're going to
pull to the opposite side so we need something to hold and once you find that
what you do is you bring the neck to the maximum point where you can stretch and
then you take a deep breath and then while are your counting loud up to ten you are
stretching a little bit putting a little bit of pressure pulling these muscles
there and we do this three times so come to the maximum point take a deep breath
and 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 - stay there don't move take another deep breath 1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 take another deep breath and go a little
bit more 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 and you should be feeling stretching these muscles here
come back slowly now hold to the other side do the same thing find the maximum
point that your neck can go take a deep breath one two three four five six seven
eight nine ten take another deep breath one two three
four five six seven eight nine ten take another deep breath one two three four
five six seven eight nine ten come back slowly so now for the trapezius muscle
which is this big muscle here on the back of our neck we have to do it at a
45 degree. In 45 degree we'll open a little bit look at the legs it's the
elbow going in the direction of the opposite knee. Again find a point of
support here and then pull the neck to the maximum that you can go. Take a
deep breath and go one two three four five six seven eight nine ten.
take another deep breath one two three four five six seven eight nine ten and
take a deep breath and go again one two three four five six seven eight nine ten
come back slowly and do the same thing for the other side. Repeat the three
times on the other side as well to stretch this muscle for the muscles in
the back. What we are going to do is we are going to go forward. This is the last
exercise in this series so we put both over the arms here relax the elbows and
go down the maximum that we can take a deep breath and go one two three four
five six seven eight nine ten relax
come back slowly we don't need to do three times. If you want you can do three
times but it's not necessarily come back slowly
and for the front muscles of our neck especially the sternocleidomastoid we
need to look up not only this but we also need to look at the opposite
corners of our room. You look at the other side we're stretching this muscles
in the front of our neck
it helps if we can massage the muscles too. We can massage before the exercises
or after the exercises and I teach my patients to do self massage. So the way
we do this is: you find a muscle this is not the muscle, this the skin, you have
to go deep and you should do this you're going to massage the sternocleidomastoid
the opposite side you can also find the most tender spots in the trapezius and
massage it, massage here and also massage the basis of the trapezius here
where the trapezius start is a big muscle so with our thumbs try to find
the skull the bone here occipital bone and try to find go side by side and try
to find an area of most tenderness and when you find you can apply pressure for
about two minutes. This is also excellent for people have headaches if you feel
that you have a neck pain and the neck pain is radiating to the head if you
apply pressure here for about two minutes you can abort the headache
that's really really good. Okay so I hope these exercises and this massage can
help if you have myofascial pain of the neck muscles. Please remember that
this video is not intended to provide medical advice, if you need help please
consult your physician or physical therapist that can
help you with this specific exercise for you. This video is only for education.
also if you liked this video don't forget to like it, don't forget to leave
your comments, to subscribe to this channel and to leave questions here and
if you want to talk to me you can also find me. I have a Twitter, Facebook page
and an Instagram account thank you for watching goodbye