Neck Pain Treatment Options

Every day millions of Americans experience some form of chronic or acute pain that affects their daily life. It can be knee, shoulder, back, or neck pain. While all these areas of pain are something that can be debilitating, neck pain is one of the more complex ones. Neck pain can be caused by a variety of issues such as poor posture, injury, or muscle strain. Since there are several potential causes of neck pain, there are also numerous treatment options for neck pain. Here are some of the most common neck pain treatment options:

• Heat or Ice Application: Apply ice to your neck for up to 15 minutes to help reduce inflammation. Then apply a heat pack to relax the pain away. You can do this multiple times a day as needed.

• Physical Therapy: Physical therapy involves constant exercise and stretching of your neck to help improve muscle flexibility and strengthen the muscles. This helps improve the range of motion and stabilizes the muscles.

• Massages: Massages help to relax your neck muscles and reduce tension. This can help alleviate neck pain.

• Pain Relievers: NSAIDs like Tylenol, aspirin, and acetaminophen are all common pain relief medications that can be bought over the counter. However, these are not treatment options that can be used alone. They are meant to be used in combination with other treatments.

• Surgery: Surgery is an option when all other options do not work. Our pain management specialist exhausts all other viable options before recommending that surgery be performed. However, some causes of neck pain like herniated discs often require surgery to be properly treated.