Do you feel those aches and pains in your neck from time to time? Do you feel stiffness in your neck getting out of a chair after sitting for a while or working in the office with a computer job?
The neck—or cervical spine—is a coordinated network of nerves, bones, joints, and muscles. It has the important job of providing support and mobility for the head, but sometimes it can become painful.
This article will give you the signs you should not ignore when you are experiencing neck pain.
1. When you have neck pain for more than 6 weeks and it's not getting better with rest or painkiller.
2. When your pain is going down your arm and back.
3. Light tapping on the spine is painful.
4. Weight loss without dieting is a potential sign of cancer.
5. If you have sleep deprivation due to pain.
6. A fierce headache, and/or an inability to bend the head forward (nuchal rigidity), and/or fever, and/or altered mental state are all symptoms of meningitis (inflammation of the membranes covering the brain and spinal cord, caused by infection or drug side effects).
7. When you have signs of nausea, vomiting, and dizziness.
8. Severe throbbing pain in the neck and posterior occipital region.
Neck pain usually goes away within a few days or weeks. Most neck pain sufferers will try over the counter pain-relieving drugs and bed rest. But for the majority, these self remedies will not provide the relief that they need, In fact, bed rest or self-stretching can often be the wrong thing to do, because it can weaken the spinal muscles further. Weakness in the spinal muscles is one of the main reasons for neck pain and puts you at risk for injuring your neck with common daily activities such as bending, rotation, and extension. Most of us sit too much with neck tilted forward and flexed which can cause severe neck pain and tension on the neck and upper shoulder that lead to cervical injury.