Cervical spondylosis is committed, neck pain!
Modern people work busy, fast-paced life pressure, long-term ambulatory work, use of computers, do not pay attention to cervical spine health care, resulting in the incidence of cervical spondylosis is increasing year by year.
Cervical spondylosis is mainly due to long-term strain, osteophytes, or disc protrusion, ligament thickening, resulting in cervical spinal cord, nerve root or vertebral artery compression, resulting in a series of dysfunctional clinical syndrome. The cervical spine is located between the head, chest and upper limbs, and is the smallest of the spinal vertebrae, but the most flexible, most frequently active and heavily loaded segment. Long hours of neck in a posture, ambulatory work, operating a computer, looking down at the phone, high pillow, etc., easy to cause strain on the neck muscles, cervical degeneration. Patients suffering from cervical spine disease often initially show neck and shoulder pain and numbness in the hands, and some show dizziness and even unstable walking. When the symptoms of pain at the back of the neck occur in daily life, you should be alert to the occurrence of cervical spondylosis, which is an early warning signal of the body to the disease, and what it wants to tell you is actually that it is time to let your cervical spine rest and rest. When there is only neck and shoulder discomfort, most of them are strain-induced myofasciitis, and if not controlled at an early stage, chronic pain can develop, which can easily recur and leave “roots of the disease”.
What tests should be done for cervical spondylosis patients?
Special examinations should be selected according to the patient’s different conditions, mainly based on the patient’s different medical history and physical examination characteristics, combined with the doctor’s judgment. Different special examinations have their own advantages and disadvantages, and therefore have different scope of application.
There are more auxiliary examinations that can be done for cervical spondylosis, and the most used and popular one in clinical practice is cervical spine X-ray. Cervical spine X-ray is clinically important and is the most routine and basic special examination in the diagnosis of cervical spondylosis. X-ray radiographs can clarify the presence or absence of bone destruction and deformity of the cervical spine, and observe the presence or absence of bone spurs, narrowing of the spinal space and ossification of the posterior longitudinal ligament of the cervical spine. More importantly, radiographs are an essential basis for positioning during surgery. In addition to cervical spine X-ray, there are many special imaging methods, such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), CT, myelography, body layer photography, etc., as well as other functional tests such as electromyography, evoked potentials, cerebral hemogram, etc. The specific auxiliary tests to be used clinically should be applied by the specialist according to the needs of the condition.
It should be noted that many patients have a wrong view that MRI and CT are more advanced and more advanced than X-ray plain film technology and therefore can also see more clearly and can replace X-ray plain film examination completely. Therefore, many patients, especially those who have been to many hospitals, come to the hospital with a large number of MRI and CT films in their hands, but not the most basic X-ray plain films.
Is a high pillow really worry-free?
As the saying goes, “it’s okay to rest on your laurels”, is that really true? Actually, it is not. From a medical point of view, the long-term use of too high pillow, prone to induce cervical spondylosis. Why is this? From the side, the normal human cervical spine is not straight, but there is a forward projection of the physiological curvature. The pillow is too high will make the cervical vertebrae too much forward flexion, the cervical spine rear muscles and ligaments in this state for a long time prone to strain, the front of the disc pressure and cause degeneration of the disc aging. In the long run, the degeneration of the structure of the spinal cord, nerves, blood vessels, compression, neck and shoulder pain, upper limb numbness, dizziness or walking instability and other symptoms of cervical spondylosis. The length of the pillow is generally more than their shoulder width when lying down 10-16 cm is appropriate, the height of the head and neck is usually equal to the height of their fist or slightly lower as the standard. For people who are used to lying on their side, the height of the pillow should be the same height as their side of the shoulder after compression. Therefore, the high pillow is not worry-free. Whether cervical spondylosis patients or healthy people, sleep should not use a high pillow, a reasonable choice of pillow to maintain the physiological convexity of the cervical spine, so as to prevent the occurrence of cervical spondylosis.
Cervical spondylosis prevention from the side to do
1.Change the habits of life, avoid long hours of ambulatory work, avoid maintaining the cervical spine in a posture for a long time, and keep the spine upright.
2, strengthen the neck and shoulder muscle strength exercise, swimming is a better way to exercise the neck, shoulder, waist and back muscle exercise. Normally, you can do head and upper limb forward flexion, backward extension and rotation activities, which can not only relieve fatigue, but also exercise muscle strength, help maintain the stability of the cervical spine, and protect the cervical discs and small joints.
3, pay attention to the warmth of the neck and shoulder, avoid prolonged blowing air conditioning or air conditioning temperature is too low.
4, scientific and reasonable choice of pillow, avoid the bad habit of high pillow sleep, avoid the head and neck in a state of flexion for a long time.
5.Don’t doze off when sitting in a car and avoid sudden head shaking.
6, early and thorough treatment of soft tissue strain in the neck and shoulder to avoid its development into cervical spondylosis.
7.An optimistic attitude to life, a healthy lifestyle, and let the cervical spine relax outside of 8 hours, and properly participate in swimming, badminton and other exercises.
8, labor or walking to prevent flash, contusion.
How to maintain a good working posture
A posture that conforms to physiology is a good posture, and the normal existence of physiological pronation of the cervical spine. In the case of neck flexion, the pressure within the cervical intervertebral disc is greater than the natural supination and extension position, thus easily exacerbating cervical disc degeneration. Although you can not work, but you can work through the regulation of the state to achieve the purpose of preventing neck discomfort. First of all, the height and tilt of the desktop should be adjusted, in principle, the head, neck and chest to maintain the normal physiological curve, the line of sight flat in front or slightly tilted 5 ° -10 °, to avoid the head and neck for a long time in the supination or flexion state. Secondly, at any time should not be fixed in a certain posture for a long time, at least no 1-2 hours to be able to move the whole body for about 5 minutes, to eliminate fatigue in the neck before continuing to work, which is conducive to alleviating chronic strain injury of the cervical spine.
How to do neck exercise for middle-aged and elderly people
Many people think that yoga, backward walking and other exercises can relieve the condition, in fact, sometimes may not. Both the cervical spine and other organs in the body of middle-aged and elderly people have undergone a series of irreversible aging degeneration. Therefore, the elderly in the neck exercise must pay attention to the intensity and amount of exercise, yoga in many movements if you can not control the strength of the cervical spine will be damaged. Older people’s balance decreases, backward walking increases the risk of inadvertent falls and cervical spine injury, and therefore is not suitable for the elderly.
Specific methods of neck activity are.
1.Cross your fingers and hold the back of the head slowly backward, so that the head to maintain the supine position, maintain about 10 seconds, repeat 6-8 times.
2. Slowly rotate the head and neck from side to side, maintaining it for about 10 seconds each time, and repeat 3-6 times each time alternately.
In addition, the middle-aged and elderly people have relatively weak neck muscle strength, often accompanied by chronic strain on the neck muscles, and the imbalance of neck muscle strength is not conducive to maintaining the stability of the cervical spine. Therefore, middle-aged and elderly people should properly exercise the strength of the neck muscles in the following ways.
1, try to contract the bilateral shoulders, adhere to about 10 seconds, repeat 6-10 times.
2, hands crossed fingers holding the forehead, give some resistance, resistance under the forward flexion of the neck, adhere to about 10 seconds, repeat 3-5 times.
3, a hand to hold the side of the head, to give some resistance, resistance under the lateral flexion of the neck, adhere to about 10 seconds, alternating left and right, repeat 3-5 times.
4, the hands crossed fingers hold the head, give a certain resistance, resistance under the head backward extension, adhere to about 10 seconds, repeat 3-5 times.
What department should I see for dizziness?
Dizziness is a complex condition. Sympathetic cervical spondylosis can cause dizziness, but its clinical manifestations are the most complex, with variable symptoms and no specific signs, making it difficult to confirm the diagnosis. Sympathetic cervical spondylosis can occur in people of all ages from young adults to the elderly, but of course it is more common in middle-aged and elderly people. Sympathetic cervical spondylosis has the following characteristics: the patient feels that the symptoms are aggravated when the head is pressed downward, and the patient feels that the symptoms can be slightly reduced when the head is pulled upward; the patient’s symptoms can be reduced after resting in bed, and aggravated after getting cold, exertion or poor rest; moreover, the patient can have the characteristics that the symptoms are light in the morning, aggravated in the afternoon or evening, and can be reduced in the morning after getting up or after taking a nap. In other words, the patient’s symptoms can be alleviated after rest and aggravated after exertion. But is dizziness necessarily caused by cervical spondylosis? Not necessarily. Diseases in neurology, otolaryngology, ophthalmology, cardiology and other related departments may also cause dizziness. For example, otoliths, hypertension, hypotension, cerebral arteriosclerosis, cerebral vascular spasm or thrombosis, Meniere’s disease (Meniere’s), vaginitis, vestibular dysfunction, autonomic dysfunction, etc. Sympathetic cervical spondylosis is an exclusion diagnosis, and the symptoms are subjective to the patient’s perception. Imaging examinations such as X-ray plain film, MRI and CT of the cervical spine do not have special significance for the diagnosis of this disease, but can only suggest the existence of lesions in the cervical spine, and dizziness may be associated with cervical spondylosis. Therefore, when there are symptoms of dizziness, the dizziness caused by the above-mentioned related diseases should be excluded first to avoid delaying the condition and treatment.