hey everybody it's doctor Jo and today I'm going to show you seven ways to
treat neck pain. so let's get started.
So the first stretch is going to be kind of a double stretch. when we have neck pain, often
there's a lot of stiffness and tightness, but it has a lot to do with our thoracic
area as well our upper back. so what I'm gonna have you do is you're gonna turn
your head to the side and find a spot to focus on. once you focus on that spot, try
and keep looking at that spot the whole time and I'm going to show you what I'm
gonna do. so let's say I can kind of see back in the corner behind me. now I'm
gonna cross my arms and rotate my shoulders or that thoracic spine the
opposite direction. I'm going to take maybe two nice big deep breaths, still
trying to look at the same spot. each
time I'm breathing trying to twist a little bit more and then come back look
forward. and then when I turn again I can look I can see a whole lot further
behind me. so I'm just kind of stretching this way rotating each way and then so
definitely do the other side. so I'm finding the spot on that side trying to
keep watching that spot the whole time, turning my upper body the other
direction, nice deep breath. as I let out, turn a little bit more, one more time big
deep breath turn a little bit more, then come back bring everything back. and then
look again and you can probably see that I can rotate a lot more. so that's just a
nice stretch to kind of get you started. sometimes you might feel a couple pops
in there because you might be getting into a motion that you haven't before.
that's okay as long as it's not a painful pop. so I just maybe do two on
each side to get started. so then the next stretch is going to be an upper
trap stretch. and that upper trap has a lot to do with neck pain that tightness,
and it's a really good one to stretch. so I like to sit on my hand of the side
that you want to stretch. and what that does is that just keeps that shoulder
down because you can stretch without it underneath there, but you're going to get
really better stretch if you're kind of locking
that shoulder down. you take the other hand and then just gently pull over
towards the side until you feel the stretch. now this is a full stretch, so
you're gonna hold it for 30 seconds. and so you can see I can do it without
my hand underneath, but then my shoulder comes up a little bit. sometimes people
tend to do this and then you're not just, you're not getting as good of a stretch.
so if you hold it down, you're just really gonna get a better stretch. it's
30 seconds. do it the same on the other side, even if just one side is painful. I
would really stretch both sides and then three times on each side for that thirty
seconds. so then the next stretch is going to be a levator scapulae stretch.
and that muscle the levator SCAP, is the one that comes all the way up in your neck
attaches to some of the cervical spine up there. and then it comes down and
attaches to your shoulder blade or the scapula. so it elevates or levates that
scapula. and so what's really important when that one gets tight is because it
brings it up, and when we're stressed out we tend to do this and kind of overwork
that muscle. and since it's attached up to that cervical spine, if it's tight, if
it's irritated it's going to put a lot of pressure there. so this one is the same
kind of thing. you want to this time bring your arm up almost like you're trying to
get your elbow towards the ceiling. and that's going to push that shoulder blade
downwards to kind of stabilize it in one spot. so you can get a better stretch. if
this is uncomfortable, you don't have to do it. some people just raise up their
arm. you can do that as well, I just kind of like this way because I feel
like I'm almost pushing that shoulder blade down. but again you don't have to
put the arm there if it's uncomfortable, you're just going to get a better
stretch. so the key with this stretch is if I'm stretching this side, this hand's
up. and I'm going to stretch down towards my opposite knee. so this one is your
nose is really going this way. you're kind of at a 45 degree angle. sometimes
people just want to go straight down or they want to go to the side, but it's
really at that 45 degree angle. take that nose down. so put your hand behind your
head and bring it down this way. so you can see it's not this way, it's not this
way, it's pulling it at an angle, and you should feel that stretch right through
there. so again since this one is a thirty-second hold, make sure you're
holding it for that full 30 seconds. that's what really gets that stretch in
there and then switch sides. that 45 degree angle, nose towards the opposite
knee, holding for 30 seconds, and doing three on each side. so another great
treatment especially when you have a lot of neck pain is using something like a
TENS unit or EMS unit or a massage unit. and so the folks at Auvon Inc sent me
their three in one TENS, EMS, and massage device. and so this is really cool
because it has 32 modes and it comes with eight electrons for square ones and
then for kind of rectangle longer ones. and this reason I like this unit so much
is because it's a little more I would say technical in terms of it shows you
the frequency, the pulse width, and the waveform. now for some people, they're not
really gonna care about that, and you might say what is that all about, but
they have a nice chart you can see here. and sometimes people might know with TENS,
EMS units and stuff, the instructions aren't always great. and the manuals
aren't always great. but so see you can see here that it shows each setting or
each mode, the frequency, the pulse width, and the waveform, and then you also have
the EMS here, and then the massage mode on the other side to show you all the
modes and the parameters for all of those. so when you're doing TENS for the
neck, I would really stick with TENS or
massage. I wouldn't do EMS across the spine. you definitely don't want to cross
the spine, so if you really want to do EMS, I would just do one side, but I
wouldn't recommend it for that. but if you want to do the TENS, you can also
have it on while you do your stretches and exercises. so you always want if
you're using four electrodes to cross the channels. so I'm going to put this on
and then I'm going to do some of the rest of the exercises for you. so I put
them on let me show you what I did real quick.
so you can see here it's almost like a box or a square pattern, and you want to
make sure there cross those channels are crossed. and the reason for that is kind of
the area of pain you want the currents to go through that area of pain. if
you're doing this, you're gonna get the currents going this way, you're not
really getting what's in the middle. so you'll still feel it, but the best effect
is that cross pattern. and sometimes manuals don't talk about that. and then
you can just start with a little bit and this one also has a lock setting. the way
to turn that off is just hit any one of the down buttons, and then you can start
changing your stuff again. that's just so you don't accidentally change anything
if it's on your side or something. now with tens units, you really want it to be
strong but comfortable. so it shouldn't be you know making your muscles contract,
but it should just be a good feeling to kind of cancel out that pain feeling and
so that's what I've got it on right now. and so it's just nice it's getting a
little pulse and kind of feeling in there so it is taking away that pain if
you've got that pain, if you've got that stiffness, it kind of helps relax
everything, and then you can continue on into your stretches and exercises. so if
you're interested in purchasing the Auvon three in one unit, you can click on
the link up there or in the description below. so the next stretch I'm going to
leave the tens unit on because I can. it's going to be a towel rotation
stretch. sometimes we'll call these and the the clinic world snags, and so what
you're gonna do is you're gonna use the towel to get a stretch, but the towel is
gonna kind of hold each segment in place. so you're gonna give a little bit of a
pull and you can put it whichever segment is kind of the most painful, but
you can move it around a little bit. so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna take my
hand and hold the opposite side here, but I want to stretch this side. I'm taking
this hand and grabbing this side then I'm taking this one coming up and over,
and I'm gonna kind of cross my ear. and I don't want to come at my neck and risk hurting
myself, but I'm gonna bring it up and over my ear kind of along my chin
jawline, and pull up and over while I'm pulling down with this hand. so I'm just
getting that nice rotational stretch. you don't want this
to be painful, you just want it to be you know comfortable a good tension kind of
stretch. and again really of trying to hold it for that thirty Seconds. getting
that nice stretch. but I'm not just pulling straight over. I'm pulling up and
over with this top one, and I'm pulling down with this one. and then so you're
gonna switch and do the other side. so now I'm grabbing down with this one and
I'm bringing this one up and over that ear pulling up towards the ceiling and
across and pulling down with that one. so that nice good thirty second stretch and
then doing that three times on each side. so once you've gotten everything
stretched out, you know that maybe it's been a little bit better a little bit
looser, you want to go into some strengthening. strengthening the muscles
around the neck area. one of the ones that I really love the most and if you
watch some of my videos you'll always hear me talk about chin tucks. chin tucks
are really good because it helps with a lot of things including your posture. if
you've got bad forward head posture, if you've got that pain if you're
overworking muscles, if you're over stretching muscles, it's really just a
great way to kind of reset everything and help strengthen those muscles back
into the position they're supposed to be in. so a chin tuck is not going down
tucking in your chin, but it's really pulling your chin back in almost like
you're trying to bring your whole head behind you. like if my hand was here I'm
trying to touch my hand with my head, but sometimes what I like to do is just kind
of put my finger on my chin as a target. so you can see if there's a little bit
of space, or if you're this far out, you'll notice it. so what I like to do is
I start with my finger on my chin, but I'm gonna leave my finger in the same
spot, and just move my chin away from my finger. so I'm coming in you get a whole
bunch of those nice little Chins right there, and just hold it for about five
seconds, just a little pause, and then when you come back in a lot of times
you'll have a little space between. I know I moved my finger a little bit when
I was talking, but a lot of times you'll see a big difference there. so do this
about three to five times. you don't have to put your finger there, but I think I
just feel like the first couple times that kind of helps you figure out what's
going on. so you're just holding that again for five seconds, really kind of
squeezing in and then relaxing. and you should really
feel all that working. it shouldn't be painful. sometimes people say it's a
little painful if it's pressure or tight that's fine, but if you're feeling any
kind of sharp pain, you don't want to do that. you want to make sure checking with
your doctor or your physical therapist if that's, this is what you should be
doing. and then so the last one is just going to be kind of a combination of the
chin tuck and then getting those deep flexor muscles working in those are
really important because they're kind of hard to stretch or exercise. if you're
getting a really big forward head posture. so what you wanna do is you want to come
back into that chin tuck. you want to bring everything in, and then you want to
go down like you're tucking your chin that way too. but once you go into that
chin tuck and you're trying to work those deep flexor muscles, you're not
going to be able to go very far. so you're going to feel like here you're
gonna feel that stretch back there, and then come back up. if you need to reset
each time you can, or if you can hold that chin tuck the whole time go down
just maybe a two to three second pause, come up, go down to two three-second
pause. but make sure you're not letting it go. if you're like oh well I can do
that, then you're probably not doing it right because you if you're getting
those deep flexor muscles, you're not gonna be able to flex down a whole lot,
but you're gonna really feel it working in there. so there you have it. if you're
interested in purchasing the Auvon three-in-one unit, you can click on the
link up there, and don't forget to subscribe by clicking down there. and
remember, be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon.