Rheumatism: The Neck - Part 2 |
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You may ask whether it is any use knowing that a pain in the neck is caused or made worse by worry. It is. In the first place, having the worry out in the open instead of brooding on it often brings relief. Secondly, the knowledge that this pain is associated with worry can remove a host of fears about all the other things that might have been the cause. Thirdly, if you keep on and on having this kind of pain and your recognize that worries are the cause, you can take your worries to your doctor, to your priest or to a wise friend, and allow him to help you come to terms with them.
This, however, is in the field of long term prevention. If your neck hurts you want something done now. This take us straight back to the general treatment of a mild attract of rheumatism, which relies on warmth, medicine and possible massage.
After middle-age, wear and tear are commoner causes of rheumatism in the neck than muscular rheumatism. The condition is sometimes called cervical spondylitis (or spondylosis), but for practical purposes it is a form of osteo-arthritis. The importance of it lies in the extra bone (oesteophytes) that is deposited round the edges of affected joints to such an extent that it may press on the nerves as they enter the spinal cord; this send messages up to the brain which the brain registers as pain coming from the part of the body, such as the arm, from which the nerve came. The same sort of thing happens if the cause of the trouble is a slipped disc. Despite the entirely different way in which the pain is caused, the ways relieving it are the same as in a younger person. If the pain keeps on returning it may be necessary to restrain the movements of the neck joints by putting on a collar made of corrugated cardboard, rubber foam or plastic --- hot but effective. |
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