What if we could prove beyond doubt, if your neck is the true cause of your headache symptoms during your first assessment?
Ongoing headaches and migraines can have a very adverse effect on an individual’s wellbeing and quality of life.
Often, medication is the first solution we turn to manage the pain. However, medications only provide temporary relief before the headache strikes again. The reason for this is because pain medication only masks the symptoms of your condition, it does not treat the cause of your headaches, so remains no surprise that they continue to reoccur.
Traditionally, headaches have been categorised into numerous conditions such as migraines, cluster headaches, cervicogenic headaches, tension headaches or menstrual migraines to name a few, however, these categorisations no longer appear to be relevant.
Recent research by leading Musculoskeletal Physiotherapist, Dean Watson PhD, suggests that many of these conditions are all part of the same disorder, a sensitised brainstem. The sensitised brainstem is often the real cause of many headache-related symptoms.
Understanding the brainstem, the true causes of our headaches.
The brainstem is the stem-like part of the brain that connects the nerves from the brain to the rest of the body via the spinal cord.
The brain stem connects to the first three vertebrae of the upper cervical spine, also known as the C0-3 region.
A dysfunction or misalignment of these three vertebrae in the neck is usually the cause of a sensitised brainstem – the true cause of many of the above-mentioned headaches.
Sounds interesting – But what is a sensitised brainstem?
The brainstem filters information from the body to the brain, information such as pain messages.
If the joints in the top three vertebrae (C0-3 region) are not correctly aligned, they become irritated and in turn, irritate or sensitises the brainstem. Once the brainstem is sensitised, a normal amount of information passing through becomes magnified and experienced as an overload of information – the result is a severe head pain.
How do you diagnose this condition and prove it is the cause of my headaches?
If you have been experiencing ongoing headaches and migraines, our spinal consultant, Mr Leo Hyun trains in the Watsons Headache Approach, a method of assessment and treatment that can determine whether the neck (also referred to as the upper cervical spine) is causing your headache or a migraine.
The Watsons approach involves gently adding pressure to the upper cervical spine, the symptoms of your headache will reproduce. If symptoms appear this indicates your neck is, in fact, the real cause of your condition. From here, gentle manipulation of the upper cervical spine will be performed to desensitise the spinal cord in real time while reversing the headache symptoms.
By using this approach, we may be able to accurately demonstrate beyond doubt that your neck is the true cause of your ongoing headache or migraine symptoms, allowing us to then provide targeted treatment rather than a hit and miss approach.
A thorough assessment of your condition by our spinal consultant may make all the difference to your life and wellbeing.
For more information, or to book an assessment for your headache or migraine symptoms, please call us on 07 3841 3070
