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Denver, CO – You may be wondering what cervical radiculopathy is or even it’s causes. Perhaps you’re wondering what a cervical radiculopathy diagnosis even means. In this video a we will explain symptoms, exercises and stretches to perform at home. This will include exercises to avoid. You’ll learn why you likely have pain in your neck and shoulder radiating down your arm in easy to consume content.
Do you have pain that travels into your upper back? Maybe the backside of your arm goes past your elbow into your pinky and your ring finger. Maybe you have pain that travels down the front side of your arm into your forearm and into these fingers. Or maybe your pain is right here in between your shoulder blades or maybe it’s right underneath your shoulder blade and it just will not go away. If so, you just might have cervical radiculitis.
In this video, we’re going to talk about what that is, why you have it, and what we’re going to do to take care of it at home using no special tools. Okay, so firstly, why do you have cervical radiculitis? This comes down to one of two particular reasons. Either the nerves are being compressed in your spine or they’re being sheared and they’re moving abnormally. What this does is it causes irritation of those nerves and we have that subsequent traveling pain that’s going on, so let’s talk about what we’re going to do to take care of it.
First thing we’re going to do is traction with simply our hands. We’re going to use a web contact here. We’re going to go into what’s called the mastoid process. It’s just a fancy word for this bone right behind our ear, right here, just like this on both sides. We’re going to raise our neck up just like this. Now, I do want to give you a bit of a heads up. You want to avoid a palm contact with your jaw. We don’t want to induce any sort of jaw issues, but you can maintain this contact. Most of that contact is going to be the web of your fingers, right into your occiput or mastoid process. Rather, go ahead and raise this up. Hold it for about three to five seconds and relax. Raise it up three to five seconds and relax.
Okay, next option that we have is going to be at a tabletop or a desk. Here’s what that looks like. Same contact web, your thumb, right at the mastoid process. We’re going to use our elbows on the flat of the surface, like a countertop or a desk just like this. Again, contact right here, and we’re going to simply lean back or squat down while maintaining that pressure. It’s just going to feel really nice. Hold for three to five seconds and relax and repeat.
Okay. You might have a seated situation like a desk. I’m going to show you what that looks like. Okay, so similar idea. We’re going to use the web of our hand here as a contact, right on that mastoid process. There’s bony part right behind our ear, both sides just like this. We’re going to use our elbows. We’re going to put that on the flat of the desk just like this. Now, if you have a chair that is simply immobile and it’s not rolling, that’s totally fine. You’ll look just like this. Again, we’re going to apply that pressure into that area right behind our ear, and we’re going to pull up just like this. You’re going to feel a really nice gentle stretch as we do that. Even better is if you have a rolling chair. Let me show you what that looks like. So same positioning, but we’re going to simply going to roll our chair back while we maintain that positioning. Now, I really like this because this is going to allow you to have an additional stretch in its controlled movement, so this feels the best so far. I love this.
One last option that we have is going to be with a towel. Let me show you what that looks like. Okay, so towel traction. Let me show you the way that all the gurus recommend that you do it, and let me tell you why I don’t really care for this. Okay, so all the gurus say to take the towel, put it behind your head, put it at the base of your skull like this, and to raise it up. Well, there’s a couple of reasons why I don’t really care for that. First of all, when you have traveling symptoms going on in the arm and the hand, this is a very difficult thing to pull off.
In addition to that, it squishes your ears. Your knuckles are going into your skull. It just generally does not feel good. So let me show you an alternative that I like even better. Hand towel right around the neck just like this. We’re going to pull down just like this, perfect, and we’re going to extend our head backwards just like this, okay? We’re going to hold that for about three to five seconds and relax and repeat. You can do that about five to six times. Last option that we have also involves a towel. We’re going to take that same towel. We’re going to fold it in on itself into thirds, and we’re going to roll it up just like this, and we’re going to lie on the ground. I prefer the ground because it’s nice and flat. We’re going to put this right behind our neck like this, and the key to this is we want our head to be nice and flat touching the ground.
If your head is floating, you have too much support. So what we do there, if that’s the case, is we simply undo the towel, just slightly put it back underneath our neck, so, and then we lay down on this. Again, in an ideal situation, our head is going to be nice and flat touching the ground. If it is, that’s the excellent position that we want. Now, we want to maintain that position for about three to five minutes. You don’t want to do more than that. However, you can do that multiple times a day if you need to. I’m Dr. John Brockway. I’m a chiropractor in Denver, Colorado. I hope you enjoyed this video. If you did, be sure to share and subscribe as this channel is about really helping you to stretch, strengthen, and stabilize your body so that you can move free without pain and get back to life again. Now, if you enjoyed this video and you would like a more advanced option, be sure to check out our video here on how to treat cervical Radiculitis at home using some additional tools.
