Text Neck Syndrome

What’s a Text Neck Syndrome?

• Text neck is a term used for the unusual posture formed by bending forward neck for a long period of time, for case seeing smartphones for a prolonged time while reading and chatting activity, is reported to have Neck stress injuries. This posture basically results in upper back cervical muscles and shoulder pain, headaches, and thoracic kyphosis.

Doing this

• The strain on your spine
• Causes a lot of tightness in your neck and shoulders muscles
• Causes upper-back pain
• The pain generally is there over time and might go away after many days or weeks, or it might go away and come back episodically over many times. The stiff neck and neck soreness could spread down into your middle-back and shoulder blades, occasionally indeed into your arms and forearms. It can be sharp at a period when you move your neck around or just slight. It could cause head pain. You may feel it when you’re using electronic devices like smartphones and laptops etc.., or it might be a pain at nighttime. in the course of a moment, the pain will disturb you and have a negative impact on your common life.

Symptoms of Text neck Syndrome:

• Leaning the head forward to use a smartphone directly damages the spine.

• Flexing the head forward to 15 degrees places about 12.25kg of force on the neck area.
• This may improve to 18kg at 30 degrees,22.22kg at 45 degrees and27.22kg at 60 degrees.
• Damage caused by not treating the text neck can be parallel to occupational overuse syndrome or continuous stress/strain injury.
• The most common example of Text Neck is neck pain, tightness of the muscles, and soreness. The main symptoms include:

• Stiff neck: soreness and difficulty in moving the neck after a prolonged period of time.
• Pain: can be localized to one part of the body or may be diffused over the area, usually the lower part of the neck area. Can be characterized as chronic pain or in extreme cases it can also be sharp.
• Radiating pain: it mostly occurs in the shoulders and arms area.
• Muscular weakness: shoulders muscles namely, trapezius muscle, rhomboid muscle, and shoulder external rotators are quickly weak.
• Headache: sub-occipital muscle tightness can cause tension-type headaches.

other symptoms there can also be:

• Flattening of thoracic kyphosis posture
• Early-onset arthritis (Cervical spondylosis)
• Spinal degeneration condition
• Disc compression
• Muscle weakness & tightness muscles
• Loss of lung capacity

• Sharp or severe pain is seen in the neck and shoulder area.
• Range of motion is decreased due to stiffness or tightness in the shoulder and neck muscles.
• Intermittent or continuous headaches.
• Nerve pain with tingling and insensitivity in the upper limbs.
• Pain in eyes.

Diagnosis:

• X-ray: X-rays can help to reveal degenerative changes to the spine and problems like bone spurs.
• Computed tomography (CT): A CT scan is an imaging technology that uses multiple X-ray images to help view the neck area and whole spine in different “slices.”
• Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI): An MRI scan employs powerful magnetic and radio waves to create highly detailed images of the bony area and soft tissues, including those of the spinal cord.
• Electromyography (EMG): An EMG and nerve conduction study involves the insertion of a needle into a muscle to test nerve signal speed, which can help diagnose a pinched nerve.
• Blood tests: A complete blood count (CBC), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and C-reactive protein (CRP) test can help recognize if inflammation or infection is present.

Treatment of Text neck syndrome:

• The following conditions from a systematic review of Text Neck should be kept in mind while using smartphones or other hand electronic devices:
• Avoid excessive usage and take frequent breaks in between.
• Denied prolonged static postures.
• Position the device in such a way that it decreases stress on the upper extremities, head, and neck area
• Avoid more repetitions of movements such as long periods of time chatting or swiping
• Do not hold large or heavy devices in one hand for a prolonged period of time
• Rehabilitation was found to be very effective in treating patients resulting from neck pain. A rehabilitation program can be treated as a two-four week program starting with soft tissue mobilization and we can also have Grade one and two joint mobilizations, active and passive stretching of stiff muscles, and go forward to muscle strengthening exercises, posture retraining and we can do a home exercise program.
• Pain relief is the main aim in active cases. It can be achieved by:
• Regular neck movements: rotations and side bending
• Restoring function to the upper trapezius muscle and serratus muscles
• Chin tuck exercises
• Ice/heat packs
• Massage
• In severe chronic cases, pain relief medication, injection into the facet joint, or trigger point can be done.

Physiotherapy Treatment:

Stretches for Text Neck

• Do this stretching to help loosen tight neck muscle and back muscles located along the thoracic and cervical spine, plus promote better good posture and upper body alignment.

Lateral neck stretch

• Lateral neck stretching is used for the upper traps muscle, where there is more tension. Just sit or stand in a chair with the correct posture (shoulders should be at back and head should be in a neutral position). Bring your left ear sideways towards your left shoulder and Keep the right shoulder relaxed position. To improve the intensity of the stretch, you can anchor your right hand on the bottom of your chair or you can also extend your right arm out to the side.

• Keep your upper body relaxed and pain-free and Hold for 30 or more seconds for two-three sets. Then, change directions.

Neck Rotation Stretch

Active Neck movements

• While doing stretch pick some of the deeper sore spots in the cervical spine area. Sit in a chair and with a good posture. Make sure that the neck should be in a neutral position before starting to prevent any deformities and bad posture. after that, rotate your head to the right as you see over your right shoulder. When you can’t go anymore, apply gentle pressure and hold and place your left hand on your cheek area. Never force this stretch and always keep the neck in the neutral position.

Exaggerated nod

• The exaggerated nod counterbalances the downward and toward head position by pulling your shoulders down and back and improving neck mobility.

How to do it:

• Sit at your desk or relax your shoulder while standing position. With your mouth closed and make sure your teeth touching but not clenching and look up to the roof.
• Stop here and open your mouth and relax your jaw. Now see if you can bring your head further back up to an inch or two.
• Keep your head fixed there and bring the lower part of the jaw to the upper part of the jaw area, closing your mouth. You should feel a stretch in the front area of your neck.

Downward-Facing Dog

Adho Mukha Svanasana(downward-facing dog)

• The downward-Facing Dog exercise is useful for opening the front chest wall and shoulders. which are often rounded and stiffened from overuse tech usage. This is all about upper-body muscle strength, which means if you do not have shoulder strength you might compensate by bringing your shoulders up to your ears. If you note yourself doing this, actively put your shoulder blades down your back side, which will create space in your neck area.

How to do it:

• Begin on all fours. Push your toes and lift your hips up, reaching your hip bones toward the roof.
• Reach your heels back toward the mat, but do not let them put on the floor.
• Drop your head down so that your neck will become long. As you stay here, make sure that your wrist should stay similar to the front side of the mat.
• To decrease the pressure on your wrists, press on the knuckles of your forefingers and thumbs.
• take at least 3 deep breaths and then release.

Cat cow pose

• Your core and pelvis should drive the Cat- Cow flow As you inhale you produce an anterior tilt to the pelvis so that your tailbone should face the roof, and while you exhale you produce a posterior tilt so that your tailbone is facing the floor. This movement also helps improve spinal awareness, which is very important for good posture.

How to do it:

• Start on all fours with your shoulders should be over your wrists, your hips store over your knee area, and the top part of your bases pressed into the ground stretch your head down to your tailbone to see a few inches in front of your fingers.
• To begin the ‘ cat ’ phase, as you exhale use your abs to curl your spine towards the roof while tucking in your tailbone. pull your neck and allow your chin to reach down and in, toward your chest side, so you can see your ears come down by your biceps muscle.
• To begin the ‘ cow ’ phase, as you inhale swoop and scoop your pelvis so your stomach drops down to the floor. Widen across your shoulder blades, keep your shoulders away from your ears, and lift your chin up and chest to look up towards heaven.
• Cycle through Cat-Cow poses a few times, keeping stress and pressure out of the head and neck.

Bow pose

• Bow pose helps to counteract slouched shoulders by stretching the pectoral muscles and strengthening upper back muscles.

• Lie flat on your abdomen with your chin on the ground and your hand resting on either side of you.
• Flex your knees and bring your heels as close to your glutes as you can. Reach the backward side with both palms and grasp hold of your outer ankles. As you inhale, raise your heels up toward heaven so that your chest, thighs, and upper torso elevate off the ground.
• To intensify the stretch, try to elevate your heel area higher while keeping your tailbone pressed into the floor. Look forward and move your shoulders away from your ears.
• Hold this position for ten breaths. Release an exhale by slowly lowering your thighs, and also the rest of your body, to the ground.

Chin tuck

• It is a simple exercise you can do at your workplace, at your home. This simple stretch will help improve spinal awareness while strengthening the neck muscles to help pull your head back into alignment, says Cappo

CHIN TUCK

How to do it:

• Sit up straight in a chair and keep your chin similar to the floor. Without leaning your head in any direction, gently draw out your head and chin back, like you are making a double chin. Be careful not to stick your head back. You should feel a stretch throughout the back of the neck area.
• Now imagine there’s a string pulling your head upward like a puppet and actively elongating your neck. Actively push the base of your head away from the base of your neck area. Keep your jawbone relaxed position and hold this position for three deep breaths.
• Release your chin forward. Repeat ten times.

Effleurage massage to relax the muscles

How to do it?

• Effleurage is a type of massage technique that helps to relax the muscle and increase blood circulation and lymph flow. Effleurage is the most commonly used massage technique performed in such a way that it does not try to move the muscles located just under the skin area, that’s why it is also called gliding.

How to Prevent Text Neck Syndrome?

Following are a few preventive ways that may helpful:

• Change position how to hold the phone
• “Bring your smartphone to eye level so your head is not slouched forward position or extreme. Keep a neutral spine position so your ear is in line with your shoulders,” says Cupp. This will prevent forward-head posture.
• Take phone breaks
• Frequent breaks from the smartphone can help, even if it’s just two to three minutes every hour. “Getting rid of the pattern of looking down to use a smartphone or any work is mostly given the advice to prevent text neck, but that’s highly discomforting for most people. So instead of that, I recommend that people try to consciously take breaks from their smartphones,” says Goodrich. “Set reminders on your smartphone or computer, or use a sticky note. This little awareness can make a huge difference.”

Try the Text Neck app

• There’s a Text Neck app for Android that offers “instant real-time feedback” about your incorrect body posture (indicated by a green or red light). There’s also an optional beep reminder to tell you when you have lapsed back into bad habits.
• If you experience a long period of pain, find out the cause
• If you experience long periods of pain recommend getting adjusted, which helps relieve pain and address the structural issues that text neck creates over time. And they might be onto something. A 2007 review trusted Source pointed to chiropractic care as one of the major nonpharmacological interventions considered effective for acute and chronic neck pain and back pain.
• Do ten minutes of yoga
• The better way to treat and prevent neck pain and back pain is yoga. The reason behind it helps improve movement patterns, improves body awareness, and incorporates breath work. Neck pain is caused by a muscular imbalance, such as tight rhomboid muscles, but daily yoga sessions can help correct those differences. Doing the exercises mentioned above or ten minutes a day of yoga can make a difference in text neck condition.

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