♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the internet ♪
- Hi folks, I'm Bob Shrupp, Physical Therapist.
- Brad Heineck, Physical Therapist.
- We are the most famous
physical therapists on the internet.
- In our opinion of course, Bob.
- Simple question: is it bad to crack your neck?
A lot of people wanna know the answer to this, Brad.
- Some people are pretty good at cracking.
(imitates cracking sound)
- That's right.
- They can get that crack pretty easily.
- By the way, before we answer that,
if you're new to our channel,
please take a second to subscribe to us.
We provide videos on how to stay healthy, fit,
pain-free, and we upload every day.
Also, you're gonna wanna join us on
either our website or social media channels
because we're always giving something away.
We're giving away something really cool right now.
Bob and Brad dot com, go to the giveaway section.
Or go to Facebook, Bob and Brad.
It's on our other ones too
but it's a little more harder to find.
- Oh okay.
- So, we're giving away a sit to stand desk.
It's by Varidesk, it's the Pro Plus 36,
and this is the number one company in this area
of stand up desks, they have electric ones,
they have manual ones.
- It's commercial duty,
made for the professional. - Really well-made, yes.
And this one in particular that we're giving away
actually has 11 different settings.
So you can see I'm working my way up here
and each one holds, I don't know,
do you remember the weight that it'll hold?
Do you remember?
25 or 35 pounds or something like that?
Okay, we're not sure.
- It's gonna be enough.
- It's gonna be enough to hold your computers and stuff.
You couldn't lay on it.
So anyway, nice device.
We're gonna give away one of those.
Just sign up.
We just need your email and your name
and we'll be in like Flynn.
- There you go.
- Okay.
- So we're done with that part Bob?
- Yeah, we're done with that part.
- Neck cracking, cracking of the neck.
Is it good, is it bad?
- Short answer?
Possibly.
(laughter)
We're not gonna give you a definitive answer.
There's three reasons.
One, there's a very small chance of damaging arteries.
There's a lot of arteries in here
and it could actually cause a stroke.
- Actually there's two specific arteries
that go right in the spine itself,
vertebral arteries, - Vertebral arteries.
- They go up to the circle up here which feeds the brain
and if you interrupt those two arteries,
it's gonna be a problem.
- Right and you could actually cause a clot
that could go up and cause a stroke.
Now, what are the odds of that?
Depending on different studies,
one in one or two million people.
Also I've read as low as one in 400 thousand.
Still very low.
- Very low.
- And I'm sure that odds are a lot higher as you get older.
Wouldn't you assume that Brad?
- Sure, right.
- Not to say that this is not something we haven't seen.
Brad actually saw a case like this.
- Right, there was a person in the skilled nursing field.
He was there long-term as a result
of his neck being manipulated and it caused a stroke.
- Okay, and I saw a study that had
studied 37 different people that it had happened to.
- Sure.
- Not a non-factor, but it's very, very small risk.
Another thing I've seen some people say,
and this is chiropractors cause
they don't want you doing it on your own.
- Right.
- That you could stretch out ligaments of the neck.
Ligaments hold bone to bone.
- Right.
- And if you stretch them out,
you're gonna affect the stability of your neck.
I think this is less likely.
I imagine maybe you could,
you know how hard it is to stretch ligaments.
- Right.
I think over time, if you're doing it repetitively,
day after day. - To the same ligament?
Then I could see it possibly happen.
And number three, your cracking your neck
for pain relief, a lot of people.
- Sure.
- You could actually make things worse.
Especially if you have a disc problem in your neck.
- Right.
- And you could actually make
that disc problem worse by cracking it.
- Right, as a matter of fact,
I know there's chiropractors who are
very good at manipulating and cracking the neck.
If there's a disc problem, often times,
they won't do it. - Yeah, they won't do it.
- Same with the lower back as well.
- And that's a reason again,
why it's probably a lot more dangerous
to try to crack your own neck
rather than have a Chiro do it.
- Right and there's those people out there.
I remember when I was working,
this guy was in his late teens, around 20.
He could just go like this and it'd always crack.
- Yeah or this.
- He just did it to make people go, "Oh, don't do that!"
- Right.
- And he goes, "Oh, it doesn't hurt."
(imitates cracking sound)
- So if you wanna try to break that habit,
we can show you just a couple stretches to do
and something that'll relieve that desire
to have to crack your neck.
- And they are good stretches regardless.
Stretches for posture.
- Yeah, they're good for the neck and good for pain.
So one of them, we're just gonna show you too.
One of them is just stretching
into extension, the cervical spine.
Usually, when we start this, we first do a chin tuck.
- [Brad] I'll show you from the back side.
- Chin tuck and then we take it back like this.
And a lot of times, it's good
if you're leaning up against a chair like this.
Chin tuck and then you're gonna work on
leaning back and stretching it that way.
Now Brad, do you wanna show me the
variation with using your hands?
- Right, now again, if you're gonna do this,
when you start going back, if it's painful,
you don't wanna do it.
You have something, probably having
some pain in your neck or possibly headaches.
So don't do it if it's painful.
It should feel like a nice, relaxing, good,
"Oh, that feels good," type of stretch.
But if you take your hands
and you just grasp right here on the low neck,
and then you give off a support
and do the stretch back like this.
- Oh, that actually does feel good.
- [Brad] And then you can actually pull
and you get a little mini muscle massage.
Stretch and go back with your elbows
and gets the mid back as well.
It's kinda one of those things
that's not just the neck, but it gets the thoracic spine.
- You can actually move your hand
up and down to hit different spots.
I'm gonna go down a little further now.
- There you go.
- Then I'm gonna go back.
- Right.
- And that feels really good.
Then again, you can kinda pull a little bit toward me
and like you said, give it a little stretch on the muscle.
And you can go up higher and pull.
Now, I would say for a lot of people,
especially if you have neck pain,
it is gonna hurt just to do this.
You know what I mean?
- Right.
- That's why it's great to start with the hands.
- Right.
- And you can also work on rotations.
So you're gonna go ahead and just work on
stretching it this way and that's where,
after a while, gently and as a stretch,
you can actually take your hand,
one behind the head, one on the chin itself,
and give it a little bit of extra stretch.
- Gentle.
- Gentle and also pain free.
- Right, now notice, make sure you're up at a good posture.
- You don't wanna be like this and stretching this.
That's not good at all.
- Get up like you're in the military
and then relax while you do these.
Don't over stretch you know?
Some people think if a little stretch is good,
I better do it a lot.
Don't do that.
It's gentle, relaxed, breathing.
- And there's no quick movements.
Cause you're not going...
(imitates cracking sound)
You're going just a gentle stretch.
- You may get a crack.
- Right.
- Get that cavitation, technically called.
But don't worry about that.
And probably, maybe three to five repetitions
and if you do that throughout the day,
when you're at your work station,
or wherever you're at, it would be adequate.
- I assume you'll have your hands with you most of the day.
- Right, they're available.
- All right, give that a shot.
Instead of cracking your neck,
if you get results, why put yourself at any risk at all?
- Right, exactly.
- All right, thanks for watching folks.