Injuries to the neck, called cervical spine lesions, vary in severity and form. An accident, trauma to the area, drops, degenerative modifications occurring in the spine or the combination can precede an injury to your neck. Here is a description of the most common types of symptoms, medication and more.
Automobile collisions. When you are hit in a car from behind car, the head is thrown back and forth fast, causing damage to the muscles, ligaments, and sometimes nerves of the neck.
Injury to sports or fall - Footballers are particularly prone to neck injury, but anybody can suffer from a pain that affects the muscles, tendons and ligaments of the neck.
Overuse, tension and poor posture - If you do repeated tasks involving the upper body and arms, you may be in a steep neck. Sitting too long over your computer while stressing over a tight deadline can also be a reason.
Poor sleeping position - You can wake up by sleeping with your neck bent at a strange angle (perhaps when you are on your belly) or using too large or too flat pillows.
Arthritis - Over the years, the cartilage that prevents your neck's bones can wear down and cause pain.
Pinched nerves - Often bone spurs or herniated disks keep the nerves in your spine under pressure, causing pains in your arms or hand and sometimes beautiful or tingling.
Illnesses - Some serious conditions, such as meningitis or cancer, may cause pain in the neck.
Neck Injury Symptoms
The symptoms you suffer sometimes can help a neck and spine doctor identify the cause of a neck injury.
- Aches and stiffness, which sometimes extends to your back or arms, may be a sign that your muscles or ligaments are sprained or strained.
- Shooting pain with a sensation of burning or stinging, and sometimes a pinched nerve may indicate an injury.
- Neck pain spreading to the shoulder and arms along with dizziness, nausea and headache may indicate a neck injury.
Did you ever wake up with an awful crick on your neck and wonder what it might be?
Neck often not diagnosed medically. Muscle spasm or trigger points or arthritis and/or a disk problem are usually caused by pain. Neck cricks are usually created by simple things, such as sleeping in an odd position with your neck, spending long hours on the computer and/or sudden movement of your cervical spine.
A pressure on the neck is a muscle injury that binds to the head and upper portion of the spine and pushes them. Muscle spasm, decreased endurance, and discomfort are the symptoms. Strains are categorized, and they vary from mild to severe. Grade I strains are moderate and are often managed to a point where the discomfort is tolerated without the full bed rest. Managing medicine on a regular basis is also a common way to get rid of the mild strain. See your neck pain specialist if the pain lasts more than a week, or if it disrupts your normal activities. The injury is limited to the muscle only by a grade II neck strain. Like a Grade 1 strain, the neck pain usually doesn't suggest any structural damage.
Sprains are ligament injuries. The neck sprains can be caused by falls or abrupt twists that overwhelm or stretch one or more joints in your cervical spine. (Ligaments are thick bands of connective tissues that bind bones together.) Another cause is recurrent joint tension. Neck sprain symptoms can be varying, but it may include pain in the back of your neck which gets worse when you are driving, pain that gets sluggish and peak after approximately 24 hours, headache in your back of the neck.
Whiplash-Associated Disorders (WAD)
Whiplash (WAD) is a set of symptoms following a movement incident in which the head gets hyperextension first and then bends. It is often due to automobile accidents, but it can be due to sports injuries, falling or trauma. WAD is not a medical diagnosis, like a neck crick. This episode can lead to several diagnoses, ranging from strain to herniated disks and sometimes more. Whiplash can damage joints or muscles, which can in effect irritate the roots of the vertebral nerve and more generally cause symptoms of the nerve.
Spinal Cord Injury
A spinal cord injury may occur when the spinal cord is affected, fractured, dislocated, or other neck trauma. If the third, or higher, cervical vertebra is damaged, the person may die or need a breather to remain alive.
Dislocation happens when a bone of the neck leaves its normal position and causes spinal instability. If a neck bone is dislocated the ligaments that normally keep it in place, either injury or degenerative changes, cause it to separate from the underlying bone. A dislocation may be accompanied by a fracture when trauma occurs. The bone is fully moved forward in the most severe dislocation and it locks in this position. The ligaments absolutely snap. Dislocations can damage the backbone and/or require surgery. For any of your queries regarding neck injury, contact neck and spine doctor near you.
**Information presented here is not intended to be qualified medical advice. Nothing expressed herein creates a doctor-patient relationship.