For many living with chronic neck pain, conventional treatments such as medications or chiropractic care won’t always provide relief.
Summer is a great time travel, but long trips can be hard on your back. Learn more: 7 Tips to Alleviate Back Pain on Your Road Trips
Some of our Spine-health Forum members have offered us a wealth of simple yet unique techniques for neck pain management, from their own experience. Keep in mind that not all of these are proven as evidence-based treatments for chronic neck pain, and you should speak with your doctor before beginning a new therapy.
See When Is a Stiff Neck Serious?
Take a look at some of the best of forum members' neck pain treatments:
The discs between the vertebrae in your spine require water to maintain disc height and spinal alignment and to take pressure off the spine. Each individual spinal disc is roughly 80 percent water at when we're born, with this ratio decreasing as we age and the disc degenerates.
See Video: How Much Water Do I Need to Drink?
Over time, maintaining strong daily hydration habits may prevent further degeneration of cervical discs, which may reduce neck pain.
See Lifestyle and Diet Tips for Healthy Bones
Here are tips for drinking more water:
Watch: Text Neck Treatment Video
One way you may not even realize that you’re aggravating your neck is by cradling your phone in your neck while you're talking. This puts unneeded strain on your cervical spine.
In addition, many people are starting to experience text neck by craning their neck down to look at their phone while they text or browse the internet.
See How Does Text Neck Cause Pain?
Avoid neck pain from phone use with these tips:
Watch: 3 Simple Ways to Indulge Your Spine
Many Forum members note the therapeutic effects that swimming has on their neck pain, specifically in reducing inflammation, providing quick pain relief, and easing neck stiffness. Interesting tips have included:
For some, swimming is too strenuous on the neck. In that case, water therapy, which is gentle exercise done in a warm swimming pool, is often a great alternative to land-based exercises.
In This Article:
It’s common to think of physical therapy as a treatment aimed at reducing symptoms from a given injury. While this is correct, physical therapy for the neck can also have other benefits, such as:
See Neck Exercises for Neck Pain
See What is the McKenzie Method for Back Pain and Neck Pain?
Acupuncture provides varying degrees of neck pain relief for forum members. Some people swear by its effectiveness, while others note success about half of the time. Others get no relief from acupuncture.
One forum member raised the interesting point that the efficacy of acupuncture and deep tissue massage often depends on the skills of the practitioner, making it important for patients to research these treatment methods and to really understand how to identify a skilled professional.
See Acupuncture: An Ancient Treatment for a Current Problem
Maintaining good posture is a good way to keep neck pain under control. A headrest can help to keep your cervical spine in a neutral position, so consider getting an office chair with one...and using it. Also make it a point to use the headrest on your recliner and in your car, when you can.
See Choosing the Right Ergonomic Office Chair
You can make your own gel ice packs with household items. Watch: Video: How to Make a Gel Ice Pack
Neck pain may also be joined by nagging headaches and numbness or tingling in the back of the head, neck, shoulders, and hands.
See What Is Causing My Neck Pain and Headache?
Some forum members suggest putting ice on different areas of the body (such as between the thumb and index finger, on the bone behind the ear, on the indent between the middle of the eyebrow) to help achieve relief from such symptoms.
Learn more in the Heat and Cold Therapy Health Center
Watch: Video: How to Make an Ice Massage Applicator
One creative forum member noted using a headband to secure the ice in these different spots and on the temple.
Neck pain is most frequently the result of a muscle strain or sprain. Increasing your intake of magnesium, a mineral that aids in the contraction and relaxation of muscles, may help avoid these pain causing problems.
To prevent adverse reactions, you may want to consult with your physician before beginning use of any supplement or oil.
See Food for Thought: Diet and Nutrition for a Healthy Back
Some patients note the rejuvenating effects of water pillows that allow patients to dictate the firmness of their pillow. Specifically, more water equals a firmer pillow; less water provides a softer pillow.
Various water pillow products are available and may be worth considering if you've tried more traditional neck pillows and braces to no avail.
See Different Types of Pillows
These little-known tips have worked well to relieve others neck pain, and may work for you, as well. Do you have a preferred method from this list, or one not listed here? Let us know by leaving a comment on our Spine-health Forum.
Watch: Video: Home Remedies for Neck Pain
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