Headaches

How to choose a great pillow

Is your pillow ‘painful’ or ‘perfect’?

Written by Dr. David Howard – B.Sc. (Clinical Sci.), M.H.Sc. (Osteopathy), B.App.Sc (Human Movement) from Pascoe Vale Osteopathy located in Pascoe Vale, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Most of us, hopefully, spend at least 8 hours a night with our head on a pillow. This can become a big problem if your pillow is not woman-with-pillowsupporting your neck correctly.

The spine in your neck curves in order to evenly distribute the weight of your head when upright. Whatever position you prefer to sleep in, it is important to keep your spine as close as possible to its correct alignment – which is how it is when upright. This means that the natural curve is maintained and the shoulders aren’t squashed.

Symptoms of a bad pillow

If your neck is not supported correctly when sleeping, an array of symptoms can develop such as:

Neck pain
Headaches
Migraines
Shoulder pain
Numbness and tingling in the hands (due to the nerves and blood vessels being squashed)
Upper back pain
Lower back pain
Neck stiffness in the morning
Restlessness/tossing/turning at night (which will negatively affect your immune system) 

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Tips on desk set up for perfect posture

Tips on desk setup for perfect posture

Written by Dr. David Howard – B.Sc. (Clinical Sci.), M.H.Sc. (Osteopathy), B.App.Sc (Human Movement) from Pascoe Vale Osteopathy located in Pascoe Vale, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

With technology being a big part of our lives these days many people spend long periods of time at a desk or in front of a computer, neck painwhether it be at work or at home. Poor desk set up and poor sitting posture are huge contributing factors to the many and varied symptoms of a large percentage of my patients.

Some symptoms of poor desk posture:

Headaches
Neck pain and tightness
Shoulder tightness
A feeling that you can’t sit up straight
Pain in between the shoulder blades
Shoulder and arm pain

If left for too long, these symptoms can develop into more serious issues such as:

Rotator cuff tendonitis (inflammation of the tendons of the shoulder muscles)
Bursitis of the shoulder (inflammation of the lubricated balloons between muscles)
Numbness, tingling, weakness and pins and needles in the arm.

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Causes, treatment and prevention of headaches

Headaches

Written by Dr. David Howard – B.Sc. (Clinical Sci.), M.H.Sc. (Osteopathy), B.App.Sc (Human Movement) from Pascoe Vale Osteopathy located in Pascoe Vale, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Headaches are one of the most common issues seen at Pascoe Vale Osteopathy. Headaches can range from a dull ache to debilitating migraines requiring hospitalisation.

Headaches affect 66% of men and 80% of women. 5% of adults actually experience a headache every day. Headaches may not be a serious disease but they greatly affect our everyday life, work and play.

What can cause headaches?

There are many different types and causes of headaches:
Eye strain
Toxic
Hormonal/menstrual related
Alcohol induced
Post traumatic (i.e. after a  bump to the head)
Migraine
Sinus headache
Jaw/Temporomandiubular joints (TMJ)
Whiplash
Dehydration
Due to serious disease such as a brain tumour (rare)

But the most common is the ‘cervicogenic’ headache (meaning from the neck) or ‘tension’ headaches.

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