DIY Health Tips

Why does neck pain happen?

Mechanical pain occurs when the joint between two bones has been placed in a position that overstretches the surrounding soft tissues. This is true for mechanical pain in any joint of the body, but in the spine there are additional factors. Here the tissues that surround the joints between the vertebrae, in particular the tissues in the ligaments, are also responsible for supporting the soft discs that separate the vertebrae. These tissues hold the discs in an enclosed compartment and help to form a shock-absorbing mechanism.Pain of mechanical origin may arise in the neck for the following reasons:
• The ligaments and other soft tissues that hold the vertebrae together can simply be overstretched without further damage.
• Overstretching may be caused by an outside force placing a sudden, severe strain on the neck. Examples are injuries caused by auto accidents and contact sports. This type of stress cannot always be avoided, as it occurs unexpectedly and takes a person unawares.
• Most often, overstretching is caused by postural stresses that place less severe strains on the neck over a longer period of time. This type of stress is one that we exert on our own neck, and therefore we can easily influence it. Here lies our main responsibility in the self-treatment and prevention of neck pain.
Complications arise when overstretching of soft tissues leads to actual tissue damage. It is often thought that neck pain is caused by strained muscles. Muscles, which are the source of power and cause movement, can indeed be overstretched and thereby injured. But muscle injury requires a considerable amount of external force and does not happen all that often. In addition, muscles usually heal rapidly and seldom cause pain lasting for more than a week or two.
On the other hand, whenever the impact of the injuring force is severe enough to affect the muscles, the underlying soft tissues such as the capsule and ligaments will be damaged as well. In fact, usually these two are damaged long before the muscles are. When these tissues heal, they may form scar tissues, become less elastic, and shorten. At this stage even normal movements may stretch the scars in these shortened structures and produce pain. Unless appropriate exercises are performed to gradually stretch and lengthen these structures and restore their normal flexibility, they may become a continuous source of neck pain or headache.
Complications of another nature arise when the ligaments surrounding the disc are injured to such an extent that the disc loses its ability to absorb shock and its outer wall is weakened. This allows the soft inside of the disc to bulge outward and, in extreme cases, to burst through the outer ligament, which may cause serious problems. When the disc bulge protrudes far enough backward, it may press painfully on the spinal nerve. This may cause some of the pains felt well away from the source of the trouble, for example in the arm or hand.
Due to this bulging, the disc may become severely distorted and prevent the vertebrae from lining up properly during movement. In this case, some movements may be blocked partially or completely, and forcing these movements causes severe pain. This is the reason that some people can hold the head only in an off-center position. Those of you who experience a sudden onset of pain and following this are unable to move the head in a normal way may have some bulging of the soft disc material. This need not be cause for alarm. The movements described in this book, and especially the seven exercises for the neck, are carefully designed to reduce any disturbance of this nature.