Muscle Stretching for Relieving Neck and Back Pain

Many aches and pains in the neck and back stem from tight muscles. Stretching the tight muscles along the back of your neck, strengthening the muscles in the front of your neck, and improving body posture in general can help to release neck pain. Our experts in physical therapy can help you achieve all of this.

Improving your body posture can start by simply strengthening your abdominal muscles. These help to reduce a forward-head body posture and slumping shoulders that increase back pain and stress on the spine.

In addition to strengthening the abdominal region, strengthening the pelvic muscles and lower back muscles brings stability to your spine. Furthermore, stretching the muscles of your chest and strengthening the muscles of the middle back can also help to quickly relieve neck pain by improving your posture.

Neck pain can sometimes be caused by tightness along one side of the neck, caused by holding a phone up to your ear or by looking at a screen off to one side. When the shoulder is elevated, and the head is tilted, the result is a short upper trapezius (the muscle that extends from your shoulder to your neck). The upper trapezius lifts your shoulders to your ears. Special hands-on physical therapy helps to stretch out the muscles gently, improving your motion and reducing your pain.

So before you start taking any medicine for chronic neck or back pain, you might want to analyze your body posture first and talk to your doctor about to physical therapy. Finding tension in your neck or limited range of motion in your spine might be the cause. By correcting it through proper physical therapy we provide you with a simple solution for your neck and back pain.

Try this stretch…

• In a comfortable sitting position on the floor in a chair, sit tall
• Gently lean your head to one side until you feel a gentle stretch
• Gently stretch your hand towards the floor
• You should feel the stretch comfortably on the side of your neck
• Hold the stretch for 15 seconds and repeat 3 times on each side multiple times a day

If you have any questions on performing this stretch correctly, please contact us, or your physician first. If you find yourself in pain, aching, injured or unable to move like you want to, simply give us a call. Our expert physical therapists provide a comprehensive evaluation to find the root cause of your problem, then put together a complete plan that works to get you moving, pain-free again. Schedule a free assessment today!