When you have tightness in your neck and shoulders, you might massage or tap the tight area and feel better and you could raise your shoulder higher right after that. Check a minute later how high you can raise your shoulder. It should back to the same height as before massaging or tapping or you can only raise your shoulder lower than before. So please try the following self-care method. But the most important thing is do it gently. If you can do this self-care gently, you should feel the improvement, but if you do it with strong stimulation, the same thing I talked above happens. If you already learned this self-care at the clinic, please review where to hold and how gentle you have to apply the stimulation to make better results. Gentle twisting of your hand loosens and strengthens the neck, shoulder and arm I often teach my patients this self-care for their homework. This self-care is easy and effective, but if you can't do it gently, it doesn't work. It is important to do this as gentle as you think it seems like not working. It is interesting to check which makes your body better, strong stimulation or light stimulation. This self-care focuses on more neck and shoulder area, but can change the tightness in your low back if you can do it gently.
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I have introduced this method to some patients who have had sinus problems. The self-care method is rubbing the frontal suture, which is a ditch on the frontal bone (Fig. 1). The length is about a inch. Rubbing this area loosens your neck and opens your nose, and also loosens your chest and abdomen. So if you have stiffness in your neck or sinus problems, or if you feel your abdomen is tight, try rubbing this ditch. 1. Rub the ditch-like-frontal suture with your fingers of one had like rubbing not the skin but the bone. 2. Open the frontal suture with your fingers of both hands. To get more strong contact, it is better to push your head toward your fingers. If your fingers are slippery on the skin, it is more effective to place a piece of cloth underneath and rub and open the suture. Watch the video for the detail of the method. I think a lot of people feel tight on their neck when they tilt their neck to either side because of desk work or other reasons.
This is caused by the tightness of the muscle on the sides of your neck, which is called SCM (Fig. 1). There might be a lot of people who massage the muscle of the neck, but you couldn’t quite loosen it up. So I want to share where to rub to loosen up the muscle. When you rub a part of your head, you can make this SCM softer and it gets easier to tilt to the side. Where you need to rub is the coronal suture shown in Fig. 2 as yellow lines. The location of the coronal suture is 4 fingers from the top of the head where is the center of the tips of the ears. When you slide your fingers back and forth on the suture, you feel slight bumps. That is the coronal suture. If you feel tight on your left side of your neck when you tilt your neck to the right, rub the left side of the coronal suture, moving the tips of your fingers over the suture back and forth. You don’t need to press too much. The good pressure is as strong as your nails don’t become white. This is also good if you feel tightness on the area between the neck and the shoulder. Tele-Acupuncture is a kind of Telemidicine that is scientific long distance treatment using visual information and the theory of Acupuncture medicine. The following is a case of Tele-Acupuncture treatment. A woman in her 40s was complaining about the pain in her right neck and shoulder area to her right chest when she moved her neck since 5 days ago. First, I asked her to move her neck. When she turned her neck to the right, looked down and tilted her head to both sides, she felt pain in her right shoulder to her right chest. I scanned and regulated the energy on the center line of her body with finger-needles through the screen, while she was sitting on a chair, facing to me. Then I asked her to check if she still felt pain by moving her neck. She said she still felt pain when she tilt her head to the right. So this time I scanned and regulated the energy on her right side from the neck to lower abdomen and then on her left side. I asked her to check again and she didn’t feel any pain around her right shoulder to her right chest when she tilted her head to the right. At this point, there were no pain, but I asked her to turn around and show her back to me. I scanned the center line and both sides of her back and regulated the energy, especially around her low back to buttocks because she told me she had had pain in her right hip to leg the day before this session, though there was no pain at the time of the session. 2 days later she had the second session. She still felt tightness on her right shoulder to upper back with turning and tilting her head to the right, though pain in her right chest disappeared. So I did the same treatment. When I finished the treatment on her front side, the tightness from her right shoulder to her upper back with the movement of her neck was already gone. I also scanned and regulated the energy on her back and finished the course of Tele-Acupuncture treatment for the pain in her right neck, shoulder and chest. Book and try the effect of Tele-Acupuncture: Online Appointment For more information about Tele-Acupuncture, click HERE! (1) Sitting on a couch that makes the low back lower than the knees
When you sit on a couch that makes the low back lower than the knees, the pelvis is bent backward, which applies an excessive burden on the low back, resulting in low back pain. The distortion of the pelvis causes the distortion of the spine (Fig. 1 & 2). Countermeasure: put a cushion or pillow under the buttocks to adjust the low back to the position higher than the knees. (2) Wearing a corset all the time encourages low back pain A corset is effective to relieve pain at the time of acute low back pain by keeping the low back stable. But wearing a corset for a long time weakens the muscles around the low back and causes the opposite effect, which can be the distortion of the spine. Which bag is good to prevent the distortion of the spine, a shoulder bag, a back pack or a hip pack? (Fig. 3) The answer is a hip pack. A hip pack (waist pack) is recommended to prevent the distortion of the spine because the weight is at the center of the low back (Fig. 4). A shoulder bag makes the balance between the right and the left lost, possibly causing the distortion of the spine. When you use a shoulder bag, it is recommended to change the sides to carry on every 30 minutes. A back pack looks like putting less burden on the back, but when the slings are too loose, your upper body is pulled backward due to the weight of the bag so that you have a head forward posture without thinking to keep a balance and that causes low back pain. It is important not to make a gap between the back and the back pack by tightening the slings (Fig. 5). (3) Footwear that the heel is not fixed Footwear that the heel is not fixed like slippers, sandals makes you shuffle weighing backward, which makes your pelvis tilt back and leads to the distortion of the whole body (Fig. 6). (4) A bad tooth A bad tooth makes you bite on the other side without thinking, causing the distortion of the jaw, leading to the distortion of the neck, upper back and lower back. It is important to treat your decayed teeth and bite on both sides of the teeth. First, let's check if your spine is distorted. How to check the distortion of your spine (1) Put your heels, buttocks, shoulders and head on the wall without your hands touching the wall (Fig. 0-1). (2) Raise your right leg slowly and keep it for 5 seconds (Fig. 0-2). (3) If you can keep your right leg up, raise your left leg slowly and keep it up for 5 seconds (Fig. 0-3). (4) If you lose the balance when you raise either leg, your spine can be distorted to that side. If you fall to the left when you raise your left, your spine is distorted to the left. If you fall to the right when you raise your right leg, your spine is distorted to the right (Fig. 0-4). Exercise to improve the distortion of the spine - Crawling exercise The points are: (1) Crawl in the opposite direction of your distortion (Fig. 1). When you lift up your left leg, if you fall to the left, you need to crawl clockwise (right-handed), and when you lift up your right leg, if you fall to the right, you need to crawl counterclockwise (left-handed). (2) The size of the circle to crawl Crawl a large circle at the beginning and gradually make the circle smaller because that makes the muscles supporting the spine slowly stretched and the range of motion of the spine wider without strain. Check the distortion of the spine (Thoracic spine) Extend both your arms, put your palms together and check the tips of your fingers (Fig. 1-1 & 1-2). If the tips of the fingers are misaligned, there can be distortion of thoracic spine (Fig. 1-3). Results after 1 week’s trial
Fig. 2 shows the result of 70 years old male. His back became straightened up and the flexibility when he bent forward became better by 13 cm (about 5 inches). Crawling exercise not only fixes the distortion of the lumber spine but also loosens up the tension of the muscles around, improve the range of motion and makes it easier to bend forward. Fig. 3 shows the result of 24 years old female who had had the distortion of the thoracic spine. Her rounded back became straighter and the line between her nose and jaw returned to vertical, which means the distortion of her cervical spine was also improved (Fig. 4). The tip of her fingers fit without misalignment, which means the distortion of her thoracic spine was improved. Other 5 examinees’ postures were improved as well. [Acu Note] A Case suspected of Cervical Spondylosis Got Better as Quickly as I was surprised10/16/2018 A patient with the age of 60s came to my clinic complaining pain and tingling sensation from the neck to the right shoulder. Spurling test and Jackson test, which are the examinations to check if there is cervical nerve root compression which cause neck pain, were positive, so I expected that this case would be hard and take long But against my expectation, after the first treatment, both tests were negative and no pain or tingling sensation with the movements of his neck though tingling sensation happened occasionally. At the fourth treatment, there was no tingling sensation, either. When he came back for check-up in 2 weeks, there was still no pain and tingling sensation so that the course of acupuncture treatments ended. At the first treatment, I used a tool, which gave a little strong vibration by tapping, on the tightness around his neck. From the second treatment, I just used touching needle technique with round-tip tools since the tests for cervical spondylosis were negative, but he got better much faster than I expected. Cozy Acupuncture is located in Witch City Mall in Salem, MA, specializing in pain management such as knee pain, low back pain, sciatica, neck pain, shoulder pain, menstrual pain, etc.
If you are suffering from pain or tingling sensation in the neck, give a try to Cozy Acupuncture. Call today to set up your appointment: 617-584-8703 Book now Online Overview
Neck pain is a common symptom in acupuncture clinic, but in the case that there is radiation to other parts of the body, the condition is sometimes complicated. In this case, because of the recent onset, it took a relatively short time to heal. The patient is a 36 year-old woman presented with 3 weeks of pain and tingling sensation from her neck to her right arm, fingers, chest and upper back. She wakes up every 2 hours due to burning pain. She had 3 acupuncture treatments within 11 days, and pain and tingling sensation in her neck, arm, fingers, chest and upper back disappeared. Acupuncture Treatment Detail The acupuncture treatment is based on Acupuncture Treatment for Adult. [Treatment 1] When I asked her to move her neck, she felt pain inside her shoulder blade when she bent her neck backward and also felt pain in her right shoulder when she bent her neck forward. Fig. 1 shows the painful points with pressure on her body when I checked her body during diagnosis. The treatment included strengthening Liver energy, leaving 3 needles on her head for 10 minutes and touching some points with a round-tip needle to remove the painful points with pressure. After the treatment, her painful points disappeared. [Treatment 2] She reported that the next day of the first treatment she felt pain, but since then there was neither pain or tingling sensation. There was no pain in her back and right shoulder when she bent her neck forward and backward. The treatment was similar to the first treatment, but much fewer acupuncture points were used to remove the painful points. [Treatment 3] She reported that she felt tingling sensation once, but other than that, there was no pain. On this day, she had headache on her right temple and back of her head. She said that she maybe drank too much wine last night and she had had migraine headache occasionally. Fig. 2 shows the painful points with pressure on her body before Treatment 3. The number of painful points decreased considerably, compared to Treatment 1 (Fig. 1). Maybe because of headache, I strengthened Spleen energy instead of Liver energy. The treatment for the pain was similar to the previous treatment. After the treatment, there was no abnormality in her neck and headache also disappeared, so the course of acupuncture treatments for pain and tingling sensation from her right neck to arm, fingers, chest and upper back was finished. Overview
The patient is a woman with the age of 30s. She was coming to my clinic regularly having other symptoms, but on the day before her visit, she hurt the left side of her neck when she turned to the left. She had pain a little above and inside of her left shoulder blade (Acupuncture point: SI-15) when she turned her neck to the left and looked up. The 1st treatment included the treatment to improve the energy flow in the whole body and the treatment to remove painful points with pressure around her neck and shoulder area. All the treatment was done with round-tip needles only touching or tapping the skin. Right after the treatment, she didn’t feel any pain when she moved her neck. When she came in a week for the 2nd treatment, she reported that she felt better for 3 days, but she had the same kind of pain as the last time. I gave her the similar treatment to the last time, and there was no pain when she moved her neck after the treatment. I told her to come back sooner than a week if she felt any pain in her neck. She came in a week for the 3rd treatment. She reported that she felt better for 4 days, but she went to massage the day before this visit and she couldn’t sleep last night due to pain in her neck. I gave her the similar treatment to the previous treatment. After the 3rd treatment, the pain in her neck completely disappeared. Consideration I recommended her to have treatments at shorter intervals than 1 week because she said she felt better for 3-4 days after each treatment. That is why I usually recommend to have treatments twice a week at the beginning of the course of treatments. Unfortunately, she could only come once a week. I think that 1 week interval between treatments was too long for this kind of acute pain and made her suffering from the neck pain longer than I had expected. To get better faster, it is surely better to have another treatment before the symptom comes back. Related article: [CASE] Neck pain due to sleeping on the neck the wrong way and Sty on Eye Cozy Acupuncture in Salem, MA specializes in Pain Management. If you are suffering from neck pain, we're here for you! Call Today to make an appointment: 617-584-8703 or Book now Online. |
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