Neck function is affected by your shoulder function. How you carry your shoulders influences neck pain, posture and motion.

Try rolling your shoulders forwards and backwards, stretching slowly, to help ease tension at the neck.

Exercises such as fast paced walking are important for your neck too. Walking is one of the least stressful exercises to your body and is something you can keep up well into your later years.

Finally, make sure your neck posture is kept upright when you are talking on the phone, driving, reading, doing other tasks, or sleeping. Neck support pillows are available to help maintain the normal forward arch of the neck. An excellent one is the Mediflow Waterbase Pillow. It provides gentle, responsive support all night long and helps to reduce the intensity of neck pain.

Neck pain is becoming a common problem in today’s society.  People in their 20’s and 30’s are developing severe neck pain which is adversely affecting their life. They are having to undergo long periods of treatment by a health care professional to address the pain.

Neck pain can be caused due to various reasons. Following are some of the causes of neck pain:

• Long work hours without breaks – Does your job require you to spend long hours working on the computer?  If so, please take care of your neck. Constantly working for long periods of time without taking short breaks can cause severe stress to the body especially the neck.
• Poor work posture – Always try and work using monitors which allows the screen to be at eye level so that you do not have to bend your neck. Working on your computer in bed, or looking down at your laptop can cause severe strain to the neck.
• Lack of Exercise – Exercising helps strengthen muscles. Not enough exercise can lead to the weakening of muscles.
• Poor Diet – Eating lots of junk food results in not enough nutrition going into the body. Muscles need a variety of nutrients to maintain strength. The neck muscles are often the first to give way.

Inadequate or interrupted sleep – 7 – 8 hours sleep nightly is required for the muscles in the body to relax and recuperate. Your pillow should be tailored to match your sleeping position. It’s important to maintain the natural curve of your neck while sleeping. One pillow that does this well is the Mediflow Waterbase Pillow. It consists of a soft layer of polyester fiber fill that floats over a thin water envelope. The soft fiber layer provides the comfort that people expect from a premium quality pillow, and the thin water envelope can be tailored to give ongoing support to your head and neck throughout the night by adjusting the amount of water in it. A supportive pillow such as the Mediflow Waterbase Pillow can also help to maintain your natural spinal curve between adjustments from your health care provider for whiplash or computer neck injuries.