Neck Pain with Referral? Info about Pinched Nerve Neck Pain

Sometimes, neck pain can refer to other parts of the body, most frequently to the head, shoulders, between the shoulder blades & behind the eyes. Referred neck pain is, indeed, a common cause of headaches. This pain is directly caused mechanical changes to the neck.

Neck pain with radicular symptoms down the arm is where a nerve is pinched.  Pinched nerves can cause pain, stiffness, numbness, and general weakness into the arm. Some people find that untreated, the pain can last for months and can result in loss of function in the arm and then often lead to secondary problems due to the pain and associated tension (when we tense our shoulders repeatedly in pain it impacts our shoulders, arms, neck, back, and even our legs!) When you’re in constant pain, it impacts every facet of your life. You don’t have to suffer through it. There are treatment options for pain referred from the neck, due either to a pinched nerve or mechanical strain patterns.

How do you pinch your nerves?

There are many potential causes of pinched nerves in the neck, such as: arthritis, herniated disc, bone spurs, acute injury, muscle spasm and other problems. Pinched nerves in this area could cause pain and discomfort in other areas distant to the neck itself. Those who suffer from pinched neck nerves often have resulting symptoms in their arms and shoulders.

Pinched nerves may be diagnosed through general physical examination and via running tests to identify and rule out specific issues as well. You might need an X-Ray, CT, MRI, and an EMG electrical measurement test.

What Pinched Nerve Neck Pain Treatment Options are Available?

At times, a pinched nerve will work itself out on its own. Resting, applying ice, and neck braces may be used to isolate the area in the acute stage.  Use caution even if you begin to feel better on your own as many people start resuming normal activities to soon and have a relapse.

Anti-inflammatory and pain killers may be recommended.  Treatment, such as osteopathic physical therapy would be highly recommended. osteopathic treatment for this will aim to release muscular spasm and ease joint movement to take the pressure  off the irritated nerve. Osteopathic treatments would include such as approaches spinal mobilisation or manipulation, nerve mobilisation and soft tissue approaches to relieve the pain and ease the pressure off the irritated area. In some cases surgery is required if the condition worsens or does not improve. Your  Osteopathic medicine provider can help you explore all options.

The osteopaths at Sydney Osteopathic Medicine are experts in manual medicine and experts in the treatment for neck pain. Ig you are having problems with your neck, give us a call in the Sydney CBD and lets us help you.

Neck pain referring into other areas… Is it a pinched nerve is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

For months we have been watching revolutions around the world but author Alex Pattakos has written a new book, Prisoners of Our Thoughts, talks about the revolution within, that is our personal revolution for health & wellbeing – ‘wellness’. He recently wrote an article in the Huffington Post on this issue.

This is true healthcare reform – a real viable alternative to rising healthcare costs in our society. Declining health trends with increased chronic diseases including obesity, diabetes, heart disease, certain cancers and chronic immune diseases are becoming the norm and in first world countries have reached epidemic proportions.

Lifestyle factors including poor life-work balance, poor movement and postural habits, poor diet, poor exercise habits, poor emotional/mental health attitudes, the inability to listen to ones own body rhythms have all added up to poorer longterm health and increasing morbidity as we age.

We are now realising though, that there is much that we can do to improve our health and wellbeing – in our eating, exercise, breathing, mental and treatment habits which will improve our wellness and decrease the propensity for pain, sickness and disease.

Certainly, here at Sydney Ostepathic Medicine, we are seeing just as many people coming in, not just for osteopathic treatment for their pain, but for treatment to enhance their wellbeing. People are seeking osteopaths to help recalibrate their autonomic nervous system and help improve their coping strategies, their movement and posture habits; to help them sleep better, focus more and to feel more vital and vibrant within their bodies.

For 20 to 30 minutes virtually everday you need to be doing some aerobic activity …. enough to bring on the sweat. Each day you need to eat a little less processed food and get more fruit and veges into your diet. You need get off the computer screen at least 30 minutes before bedtime. You need to attend your annual medicals and get your manual treatment routine that optimises your health … It is important that you get your body out of a sickness routine and into a wellness routine.

The Revolution Within is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

More and more of us are getting older…… much older. The fastest growing population group in Australia now is those over 85 and by the year 2020, this group is expected to triple.

This post is a little tangential from  Osteopathy and osteopathic practice per se,  but is certainly an important one in regard to our own health and wellness.

With the huge amounts of money being invested into stem cell  and telomere research ( for those of you who don’t know about this …. telomere’s are segments of DNA found at the ends of chromosomes. Every time a cell divides, its telomeres get shorter, and once a cell runs out of telomeres, it can’t reproduce anymore and dies. But there’s an enzyme called telomerase that reverses this process; it’s one of the reasons cancer cells live so long. So why not treat regular non-cancerous cells with telomerase? In November, researchers at Harvard Medical School announced in Nature that they had done just that. They administered telomerase to a group of mice suffering from age-related degeneration. The damage went away. The mice didn’t just get better; they got younger ) …. it appears that in the not too distant future we will all be living longer, and equally as importantly, vitally.

In the meantime, we are already living longer but those of you with aging parents or grandparents know that there are huge problems with aging and morbidity.

Many people who I talk to opine that they don’t necessarily want to live forever but they want to live healthily and vitally for as long as possible and then go quickly and with dignity when their time comes ….

So it appears that we are going to live longer, and until these great scientific advances become reality for us in the evryday,  we need to ask ourselves what we are doing to ensure that our lives remain vital for as long as possible?

I am gonna recommend a new Facebook group to you which produces regular updates on the latest information and tips for vitality and health as you age.  So go to your Facebook page and search and ‘like’ the page “Live Until At Least 120″.

Understand the latest information which will help slow down your aging process and help increase your vitality as you do age.

If you’re not on Facebook …. maybe its time you considered it …. taking on new mental challenges and new ideas is one of the actions you can take to help you live longer better.

Slowing Down The Aging Process is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

The holiday season is well and truly over and we are all back into our working year. So many people are sitting in front of their computers for hours on end. This is one of the common causes of back and neck pain.

One of the important things to do at work to help decrease your back or neck pain is to get up and out of your seat at regular intervals and stretch your neck and body in the opposite ways than you have been sitting. Ideally you should get up and move your neck every 20 minutes, but we all get caught up in our work and time does get away from us …. so when you can … get up and move.

It is also good to be aware of what is a good posture to have when sitting at the desk. here are a few tips and a diagram to help you sit well at your computer:

1. Have your feet flat on the floor

2. Have your hips slightly higher than your knees

3. Sit as far back in the chair as possible

4. Keep your elbows close to your body and your shoulders relaxed down

5. The top line of your computer monitor should be at eye level so you are looking slightly down at your screen

6. Sit back as far as possible while still seeing the screen clearly

7. Keep the keyboard in close proximity, keep your shoulder relaxed and your wrists in line with your forearm

8. Keep your mouse in close proximity and alongside your keyboard

Back at Work … Are you sitting correctly is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

Yes, it is that time of year again… eating, drinking, preparing menus, catching up with colleagues and friends, organising (or running away from) family gatherings, madly catching up on our workloads while we daydream about our impending Christmas break…… ah yes it is summer and the festive season is upon us.

So, from all of us here at Sydney Osteopathic Medicine, we wish you all the best over the Christmas season and for the New Year. May your bodies remain vital and your champagne chilled and we look forward to being of assistance in the coming year.

Fa lalalala….lalalala is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

Nic’s story ‘From Anxious to Happy’ is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

Following my blog the other day on happiness, many people have spoken to me to add their comments as they have come through my clinics

Here is an interesting statistic which came out of one of the converstaions regarding happiness. The mainstream research has your happiness made up of 50% genetic, 10% life circumstance and 40% in your personal control. So there is definitely much we can do to effect our happines each day.

This last week I decided to follow up on this theme by interviewing my colleague and good friend Nic Lucas about this issue. Nic, as many of you know, is an osteopath, medical researcher and now digitial media strategist (ah Nic such a big term). What many of you dont know is that over ten years ago Nic suffered a major episode of anxiety which nearly destroyed him but, as we know, didn’t….. and in fact has made him stronger.

As a result of his journey through this dark period of his life, Nic wrote a book which chronicled hs story from the dual perspective of the person suffering the anxiety attacks and the medical researcher looking for the most legititmate path out. He wrote a book, which he has now turned into an ebook called “From Anxious to Happy”

So click here to find the interview with Nic and on that page you will also find a link to a video presentation whch talks about anxiety and how you can help yourself  or a loved one in this predicament or just see Nic sing a ballad……. aaah you see, there are more hidden talents in this man.

From Anxious to Happy is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

At the Festival of Dangerous Ideas recently held at the Sydney Opera House, Ross Gittins, the economics editor from the Sydney Morning Herald spoke on a topic he called ‘affluenza’. This is also known as affluent anxiety and is a state we all see so much around us; In our quest to improve the quality of our lives we are getting more and more stressed.

An IQ2 debate in Sydney earlier in the year posed the topic ‘The Pursuit of Happiness is Making us Miserable’.

So why is this happiness so elusive and how do we find it without having to spend thousands of dollars?

A recent post from the Mayo clinic in the U.S recently put some simple advice together for helping us to find happiness. The essence of their article was that you can learn to be happy , and that happiness is modifiable and takes practice.

Here are five of their tips for taking the right actions to increase happiness in your life:

The first tip they suggest in practicing happiness is to surround yourself with happy people.

Next is to express gratitude in your life.

Step three is to cultivate optimism

Fourth, is to find a goal or a purpose, and finally

Learn to live in the moment

Click here to read the article; but before you do why not take a moment and try this quick stress test to see how stressed you really are.

A Lttle Bit of Happy is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine

I have recently had the opportunity to have a look at a new book aimed at health consumers published by a great team of medical researchers from Sydney University.

The aim of this book is to help you make the best health decisions you can for yourself and your loved ones from the vast and sometimes bewlidering range of information available. Whether you are looking at vitamin supplements or life-saving surgery, this e-book helps you make the best decisions for your health.

They have produced the information as an e-book and it is a great resource for all health consumers and it comes at no cost. It is called “The Smart Health Choices Book”. I would encourage you to have a look at it.

Simply click here to have a look at the book and, if you want, download it to your browser straight away.

Enjoy the read and enjoy your health

The Smart Health Choices Book is a post from: Sydney Osteopathic Medicine