Many people know the saying “treat the head when it hurts, treat the foot when it hurts”. People often think that headaches are caused by problems with the nerves and blood vessels in the head, without paying attention to the role played by the neck, but in fact, most headaches are caused by problems with the cervical spine. Why is headache related to the neck? Most of the nerves in the head come from the neck. The nerves emanate from the spinal cord and travel upward to the head, passing through many bony crevices and muscles on the way. If lesions occur in the muscles or bones of the neck, such as cervical degeneration or trauma to the neck muscles, the nerves passing through this area will be affected and abnormal changes will occur, and these abnormal changes will lead to headaches. What are the characteristics of headaches caused by cervical spondylosis? Most cervicogenic headaches occur between the ages of 20 and 60, and female patients with cervicogenic headaches are twice as likely as male patients. Cervicogenic headaches are caused by cervical spondylosis and acute and chronic whiplash injuries and are associated with irritation of the nerves in the neck. Patients with cervicogenic headache tend to have stiffness and inflexibility of the neck, and the head or neck is usually traumatized. The headache is characterized by repeated dull or aching pain in the occiput, top of the head, temples, forehead or around the orbits, accompanied by pain in the upper part of the neck. On examination, there is mostly pain around the neck on pressure. How to treat cervicogenic headache? Traditional treatment for cervicogenic headache is mainly based on non-surgical treatments such as acupuncture, massage, tui-na and physical therapy. However, since the main cause of cervicogenic headache is injury or aseptic inflammation of the cervical spine and neck muscle tissue, these traditional treatments, if applied improperly, can cause the injury to worsen and accelerate the disease process. If you have neck discomfort, it is most important to seek medical attention at a regular hospital as soon as possible!