Neck pain is extremely common. Studies suggest that 70% of the population will suffer from neck pain at some point in their life, and a third of the population will deal with it this year.
Neck pain is so common because people tend to constantly bend their heads forward, whether they’re on their phones, hunched over a computer, or relaxing in poor postures. Forward head flexion puts the tissues of the neck, such as discs, ligaments, muscles, tendons, and especially the nerves, under constant adverse mechanical stress.
Our neck’s unique structural setup, being a highly flexible structure that’s strong enough to carry the heavy weight of your head, makes it vulnerable to injury. Everything from stopping short in an automobile, athletic injuries, horsing around as children, and especially the birth process itself, can cause misalignments in your cervical spine (neck). These misalignments, known as vertebral subluxation, put mechanical stress on your delicate nerves, which transmit vital, life-giving information from the brain to the body. Spinal misalignments interfere with the normal transmission of information.
The fundamental problem of postural misalignment affecting nerve function is not only the cause of neck pain but also a decrease in general health.
Normal spinal mechanics and posture dictate that the neck is straight from the front view but has a normal neck arch from the side view. Research has become so specific that it measures the normal arch at 42°. Research also says that the further we deviate from this 42° curve, the more likely a person is to have disability and pain.
Where conventional medicine may use muscle relaxants, pain killers, and anti-inflammatories to treat the effects of spinal misalignment, we would be hard-pressed to see how this approach could do more than mask the problem or give temporary relief. The chiropractic approach corrects the postural structural problem so that the pressure is taken off the nerves and the pain stops. Chiropractic utilizes specific techniques to correct the postural structural misalignment, taking the stress off the nerves, and allowing the body to heal. At Rowe Chiropractic Offices, we use a state-of-the-art approach with specific Gonstead adjustments, posture-correcting therapeutic exercises, in-office traction, and home traction to reestablish normal mechanics.
$99 New Patient Special
We sit knee-to-knee for a detailed consultation on your primary concern to get an overall understanding of your health. We’ll assess your neurology, posture, and biomechanics during our thorough spinal discovery examination. X-rays may be taken to further identify the cause of your health issue.
How Our Care Plan Works
1. Freedom of Knowledge
Even in the worst of circumstances, it helps patients to know exactly what is going on. Through one-on-one doctor patient reports and group education lectures we empower our patients with the knowledge and understanding of their specific problem.
2. Freedom of Choice
The fact that you didn’t know you are supposed to care for your spine from birth is not your fault, but it is your responsibility. OUR responsibility is to guide you in the pathway to health. It’s your choice to decide how you want to participate in your health care.
3. Freedom of Health
Your health is your responsibility. Our job is to share our findings with you and lead and encourage you in the pathway to health. It’s your choice to decide how you want to participate in your health care and how you want to show up in life.
How We Treat Neck Pain In Midtown East, NY
Comprehensive Consultation and Exam
Our Discovery Exam is a comprehensive evaluation of the neck and all its structures. Everything begins with a consultation to gather information about what a patient is experiencing regarding their pain, discomfort, lack of motion, dysfunction, and correlated health problems. After we understand your experience, we’ll perform a thorough objective exam to evaluate spinal motion, areas of swelling, nerve stress, and spinal posture. A careful and specific X-ray study determines the actual structure of the neck vertebrae and structural curve to help us create a customized, case-specific, rehabilitative program.
By understanding the structure and function of the spine, we can hand-tailor a corrective program for each patient to direct them towards postural correction and thereby relieve neck pain. Corrective care may include:
- Specific Chiropractic Adjustments
- Therapeutic Exercises
- In-Office Chiropractic BioPhysics Traction
- Supportive Dennerolls to Correct Posture
Digital X-rays
A properly collected digital X-ray series is the gold standard of spinal analysis. Our state-of-the-art X-ray machine gives the most accurate depiction of a patient’s spinal structure. We can use numerous X-ray views based on each patient’s presenting problem.
The basic standard view is an AP and Lateral X-ray. To determine the spine’s ability to correct, we’ll perform intricate correction potential X-rays to evaluate your propensity towards correction.
Modern X-rays are extremely safe and beneficial because of the detailed information they gather. A simple X-ray can show:
- Spinal structure and posture
- Degenerative changes from long-standing misalignment
- Disc thinning
- Arthritic spurs
- Bony changes
We evaluate the strength of your spinal structure and develop a strategy to correct any weakening of the structure.
Specific Chiropractic Care in Midtown East, NY
At Rowe Chiropractic Offices, we will use all of our advanced tools to create a specific corrective plan for your spinal subluxation pattern. Spinal subluxations occur when there are misalignments of the vertebrae or postural distortions that affect how your nerves function. Proper nerve function is vital because they control every function in your body.
Your neck (cervical spine) is the gateway to the rest of your body; subluxations of the neck can have downstream effects. Classically, however, cervical spine subluxations impact the organs of the head, neck, face, arms, and hands, resulting in symptoms like pain, numbness, tingling, or organic symptoms like headaches and visual and hearing problems.
Chiropractors are the only professionals trained to detect and correct spinal subluxations, so seeing a chiropractor to correct your spinal and postural subluxations is essential.
Custom Therapeutic Exercise Plan
Part of our comprehensive treatment program is to assign each patient their own unique therapeutic exercise plan. These specific therapeutic exercises correct your specific postural subluxation pattern.
These exercises are important because, as we use our Gonstead adjusting technique to correct the intervertebral subluxation, we must create a strong spinal structure and alignment to maintain the corrections. Performing the therapeutic exercises helps to correct the postural issues that can cause a subluxation pattern to keep recurring. As we can correct vertebral and postural subluxations, you will reduce the pressure on your nerves and experience symptom relief.
For instance, if a person’s head and neck were bent to the right, we would create a therapeutic exercise to bend their head to the left, which is the opposite of their misalignment. Doing a one-sided, oppositional pattern will slowly realign their head and neck to the center, where they can function normally.
The key to any correction is the proper analysis of the current misalignment. Patients often ask how other structures in the body, like muscles and ligaments, contribute to their symptoms and problems. Many patients experiencing pain symptoms also experience some muscle tightness and discomfort. If there is a misalignment, the muscles become asymmetrical, where one side is toned and too tight, and the other is too weak. By exercising the weak side only, you correct the imbalance. Muscle tightness and discomfort often result from either the muscle working extra hard to stabilize a subluxated area or the nerve control of that muscle being affected by a spinal subluxation.
The type of exercises that can help alleviate neck pain depends on the type of spinal and postural subluxation in your case. At Rowe Chiropractic Offices, we will use our detailed analysis to determine which exercises are best for you and work extensively to teach you your therapeutic maneuvers, which you can do at home. These exercises will directly address whatever subluxation issue you have.
Nutritional Guidance
It’s long been understood that a poor diet leads to an inflammatory response in the body. If a patient already has inflammation from a spinal misalignment, a poor diet can tip them over the threshold of inflammation and pain. At Rowe Chiropractic Offices, we offer our patients nutritional consultation to determine nutritional tools to combat neck pain.
What we put into our bodies nutritionally significantly impacts our body chemistry and ability to heal. When experiencing pain symptoms, it is best to eat an anti-inflammatory diet because pain is a sign of immense inflammation in the body at the vertebral subluxation injury. Through improved diet and possibly a metabolic reset program, we help direct our patients to improve their body chemistry through nutrition, thereby decreasing inflammation and supporting the body’s ability to heal faster.
Common Causes of Neck Pain in Midtown East, NY
Bulging Disc
The normal anatomy of the disc is often described as a donut. In the center is a gelatinous ball bearing. Surrounding the gel center is a complex network of spun fibers. Your vertebrae sit above and below the disc and move around the ball bearing. If the disc is in the correct position, your posture and movement will be correct.
A bulge occurs if the ball bearing shifts to one side or the other. This changes the position and movement of the vertebra, but most importantly, the bulging disc puts pressure directly on the delicate nerve, irritating it and causing neck pain.
Bulging discs in the neck often cause localized neck pain and, in a more extreme condition, can irritate the nerves that control function in your shoulders, arms, and even hands. Correcting the subluxation, which is correcting the motion and position of the spine, reduces the bulging and removes stress on the nerves.
Facet Joint Syndrome
Facet joints are the two smaller joints on the back of each vertebra that, along with the disc, create the joint complex that allows our vertebrae to move normally.
Unfortunately, from stress in our posture, subluxation misalignments alter the mechanics of the disc and the facets.
Wear and tear to the facets causes Facet Joint Dysfunction, which results in pain, stiffness, and loss of movement in the neck. Over time, this stress to the facets leads to degenerative changes, including loss of movement, joint degeneration, and bony arthritic spur formation. Correcting subluxation and maintaining proper spinal hygiene combat this dysfunction, allowing the body to improve joint function and structures.
Degenerative Disc Disease
Degenerative disc disease is the term used to describe the process of spinal degeneration that occurs from uncorrected spinal postural subluxations. Like any mechanical machine that gets out of tune, when spinal vertebrae and discs are misaligned, they will prematurely break down. This wear and tear damage to the discs causes disc thinning, necessitating the body to develop protective bony overgrowth in the form of arthritic spurs.
Degenerative disc disease, also called osteoarthritis, is a vicious cycle of misalignment leading to disc and joint degeneration, leading to bony overgrowth, causing more misalignment, and on and on the cycle goes.
The only nonsurgical natural way to stop this process is to work to correct your posture.
Herniated Disc
Herniated discs are a more extreme version of a bulging disc, where the gelatinous ball bearing tears the disc fibers, causing extrusion of disc material against the nerves. Disc herniations commonly cause radiating pain, numbness, or tingling down the arms and hands.
Correcting the subluxation gives the body the best chance to heal the disc herniation and remove pressure off the nerves. The conservative approach to spinal correction has many advantages over the more invasive approach of spinal surgery, including avoiding the risks of surgery and the post-surgical syndrome, which includes disc degeneration.
Muscle Strain
Spinal misalignments also affect your muscles, causing imbalance and asymmetrical loading, subjecting them to strain. This strain could be simple, taught, tender fibers or more dramatic twisting like torticollis syndrome. Poor postural habits like a poor workstation setup, holding the phone to one ear, using the wrong pillow, and using the wrong chair make it worse. Rebalancing the structure and improving the ergonomics of your workstation helps reduce muscle tension and strain.
Tech Neck
With the modern-day overuse of technology, the term “tech neck” describes neck pain and dysfunction caused or worsened by a forward flexed neck position. Looking down at a cell phone, a laptop, or even a poorly positioned desktop creates this forward bending of the neck. Tech Neck is destructive to a healthy neck curve and stresses the nerves in the cervical spine.
Humans are not built for this modern lifestyle posture. Tech neck and the alteration of the cervical curve cause weakness and instability in the neck, making it more prone to pain and injury. With the alteration of the cervical curve, the stress on the cervical nerves can result in a variety of different symptoms, including:
- Headaches
- Numbness
- Tingling
- Radiating pain
- Dizziness
- Susceptibility to infection
Fortunately, by correcting neck posture and creating a better ergonomic use of technology, we can gain the benefits of technology without suffering the detriment of the Tech Neck posture.
Spinal Stenosis
Spinal stenosis is a process that describes a decrease in the size of the spinal canal. Your spinal canal is the lifeline of your body, through which the spinal cord runs, bringing messages from the brain to the nerves to the rest of your body.
In a normal situation, the spinal cord hangs freely in the spinal canal with plenty of extra room for spinal movements. The process of spinal degeneration, if left unchecked, can lead to such a decrease in the size of the canal that it leads to the condition of spinal stenosis.
Subluxation decreases the size of the spinal canal. Degeneration associated with uncorrected subluxation exacerbates disc bulging, further reducing space in the canal. In an attempt to stabilize this unstable spinal condition, the body lays down more bony spurs and calcium, further decreasing the canal’s size. Inflammation further exacerbates stenosis in the canal.
Postural misalignment, disc bulging, arthritic spurring, and inflammation are all causes of spinal stenosis encroaching on the cord and interfering with normal transmission. This process is commonly linked to neck pain, radicular symptoms in the arms and hands, and a general decrease in normal health.
Subluxation
A subluxation refers to a misalignment of the spine. This misalignment irritates your nerves, compromising proper nervous system function. Your nerves control everything, from your heartbeat to digestion to respiration. They are vital to the healthy function of your body.
Subluxation impedes nerve signals, and whatever tissue or organ that nerve supplies slowly weakens and degenerates. Chiropractors are the only professionals trained to detect and correct subluxations in the spine. We find subluxations using a variety of advanced skills and tools, including:
- Palpation
- Visual and static skin changes
- Joint movement
- Posture and alignment
- Orthopedic tests
- Nerve function instruments
Chiropractors correct subluxations to reduce nerve stress and allow the body to function normally using:
- Spinal Adjustments
- Targeted Therapeutic Exercises
- Curve Correcting Traction
Osteoarthritis
Osteoarthritis describes the effects of wear and tear on the joints of your spine. Arthritis is a scientific term meaning joint damage or inflammation. When we see osteoarthritis in the spine, we usually also see degenerative changes like loss of disc space, vertebral endplate weakening, and bony spur growth.
Osteoarthritis directly affects the movement of the vertebral joints and can cause extreme stiffness and loss of range of motion. When the joint is inflamed, it may feel painful and uncomfortable. The best way to prevent arthritis is to keep the biomechanics of the joint moving properly so that the joint can stay healthy for a lifetime.
Addressing misalignments can actually correct the early inflammation stages of arthritis. Once damage has occurred, however, it is much more difficult to correct, though it can be effectively managed by correcting the misalignment that initially caused it.
Chiropractors are uniquely qualified to help patients with osteoarthritis. Chiropractic techniques that can help with correcting the posture component of osteoarthritis include:
- Chiropractic Adjustments
- Specific Therapeutic Exercises
- Spinal Traction
- Denneroll Home Traction Units
Whiplash
Whiplash is the forward and backward whipping of the head in an impact collision. It is commonly associated with car accidents, but can also occur with violent slips and falls. The structure of your neck and head creates a perfect scenario for exaggerated head movements to damage neck alignment and tissues.
A whiplash injury affects the muscles, tendons, ligaments, and, most importantly, the spinal cord and nerves. Once injured, these vital tissues typically exhibit symptoms of pain and dysfunction. Pain may be localized to the neck itself, radiate down the shoulders into the arms and hands, or present as severe head pain and headaches. Even accidents at low speeds can be extremely damaging to cervical neck tissues.
It is essential to have your spine checked after any type of car accident, slip or fall, or other trauma. Driving with poor head support increases your susceptibility to whiplash injuries. Position your car’s head support so it’s slightly below the mid-point of the back of the skull. Since chiropractic focuses on spinal correction, the positive effects of chiropractic care on a whiplash injury can be tremendous. Correcting postural subluxations allows the injured tissue to heal, taking stress off the nerves and allowing the body to return to its normal function.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is a chiropractor in New York, NY, good for neck pain?
Yes, chiropractors are very effective in treating neck pain. By correcting spinal subluxations, chiropractors relieve stress on the nerve, resulting in pain relief.
When should you see a chiropractor for neck pain?
When you experience pain symptoms, your body is in an extreme state of inflammation and distress. Ideally, we address any spinal issues before they cause pain, but pain is certainly an indicator that a chiropractor should check you.
Is it okay to “pop” my own neck?
“Popping” your neck may lead to temporary symptom relief, but the reality is that when you are “popping” your own neck, you have no idea which bone you’re moving and in which direction. At Rowe Chiropractic Offices, it is of utmost importance to us to know exactly which bone is causing your problems and the precise vectors of correction we need to apply to fix your issue. Continuing to pop your neck over time without a corrective component could actually make your problem worse.
Is a massage or chiropractic better for neck pain?
While massage can have many health and symptom benefits, it cannot correct vertebral misalignments that are causing your neck pain. If a misalignment is causing your pain, addressing that problem will ultimately fix the issue. The first step is to do your Discovery Exam to determine the root cause of your problem.
Do medical doctors recommend chiropractors for neck pain?
Chiropractors should be the first professional visit for someone experiencing neck pain. Chiropractors are experts at evaluating and fixing a myriad of neck pain issues. If a chiropractor’s assessment shows an underlying medical crisis causing a health symptom, your chiropractor will refer you to the right individual to help.
Are chiropractors covered by insurance for neck pain?
Many patients choose to follow our health plans and not let insurance dictate their care. However, some patients seeking reimbursement from their insurance company may receive benefits that vary from plan to plan. Call our office today to help you better understand your health benefits applicable to our office.
How can I relieve my neck pain?
The absolute best thing you can do to relieve your neck pain is to find the source of that pain and address it directly. Nerves in your neck transmit pain sensations, and when those nerves are inflamed or irritated, that results in pain symptoms. When your chiropractor fixes the cause of the stress on the nerve, that reduces the nerve irritation and helps relieve neck pain.
How should I sleep with neck pain?
Your sleep position affects the health of your neck. Ideally, all individuals should sleep on their backs with a corrective orthotic or very thin down pillow. The next best sleep position is on your side. In the side-lying position, you want to make sure your pillow has enough support for your head to be neutral and not bent to the side. We do not recommend sleeping on your stomach.
Why does my neck hurt on one side?
Typically, when a patient experiences neck pain on one side it indicates that the pain-sensitive nerves on that side of the neck are inflamed and irritated. Your chiropractor will be able to accurately assess where the nerve irritation is arising.
How can you tell if your neck is out of alignment?
At the most basic screening level, a self-assessment can help identify neck misalignment. Look in a mirror or at a photograph to identify asymmetries in your neck posture when standing in a neutral position. However, it is important to note that issues in other areas of the spine may cause some misalignments in the neck. Your chiropractor will do the most detailed analysis to tailor a corrective exercise regimen for you.
$99 New Patient Special
We sit knee-to-knee for a detailed consultation on your primary concern to get an overall understanding of your health. We’ll assess your neurology, posture, and biomechanics during our thorough spinal discovery examination. X-rays may be taken to further identify the cause of your health issue.
