head and neck pain causes
Head and Neck Pain Causes
Head and neck pain occurring together can be a debilitating experience for anyone. In this article, you will get a brief overview about the causes and the possible remedies for it.
- Poor posture. When you are sitting for several hours in forward head posture along with rounded back, it puts a lot of pressure on the cervical spine and causes a lot of pain. This is one of the most common reasons behind head and neck pain as many people spend hours sitting in this incorrect posture while working in computers. Wrong sleeping position can also give rise to this problem.
- Traumatic injury to the neck or head. If the neck and base of skull receives severe blow directly during any automobile accidents or bad fall, then pain can be felt in both the neck and head.
- Strain or sprain in the neck muscles. This mostly occurs when the muscles are overused due to twisting or turning of the neck repeatedly.
- Mental stress. When your mind is under stress, the body muscles tend to become taut and it affects the neck muscles too. The tension in the neck muscles give rise to the painful symptoms.
- When you are dealing with a sinus infection, neck pain often accompanies the sinus headache.
- It can be a symptom of meningitis. It is a serious bacterial infection that causes inflammation in the tissues around the brain and spinal cord. Here the pain is accompanied by high fever, excessive neck stiffness and nausea.
- Neck Arthritis. Osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis are the two forms of arthritis that mostly affect the neck joint. Osteoarthritis in neck is also known as cervical spondylosis where the vertebrae wears out and its damaged portion presses the nerve roots and the resulting pain can be felt in the neck and back of the head. Rheumatoid arthritis is an inflammatory condition due to which part of the cervical vertebra moves out of its position and one or more of the neck and scalp nerves get pressed.
- Slipped disc in neck. In this condition, the cartilage disc in between the bony segments of the spinal column is ruptured and its gel content protrudes out and presses the nerve and soft tissues in the area.
- A migraine headache is characterized by a pain in the front or one side of the head and is often accompanied by stiffness and tingling sensation in the neck.