The Neck

Posted by admin Filed in Vision on Wednesday, June 17th 2009

Welcome back!

At the neck the spine becomes exposed above the level of the shoulders in order to render head support and allow us to function better. Highly sophisticated and with a complex design, the neck functions smoothly underneath without us having to consider it. The neck is an extended lever on top of which is placed the heavy head, but even then we can begin and end head movements with some speed and with very great placement accuracy. It’s very important for us to get accurate information from our most useful sensory organs such as the eyes and ears and the neck allows placement of the head in the optimal positions for this.

The structure of the neck region consists of discs, muscles, joints, bones and ligaments but it is worth ensuring that we do not forget the nervous components which are so important up here close to the brain. The comprehensive nervous control of the area facilitates movement, accepts incoming information for movement planning and controls circulatory responses. The function of the cervical spine is a compromise between the subtle control mechanisms needed and the requirement to provide as much range of joint movement as possible.

When the neck starts to give problems they are usually mechanical at least initially, in other words the symptoms vary with posture and what the person is doing physically with their neck. Neck symptoms typically include pain and loss of movement but can also cover a very long list of other symptoms such as headache, dizziness, vision disturbance, balance loss, weakness and mental difficulties. Restoration of a relative state of normality can be established by settling down the joint and other dysfunctions in the neck.

Large degrees of joint mobility are present in the cervical spinal region and this is partly made possible by the greater thickness of the intervertebral discs in the cervical region compared to the other spinal areas. Larger ranges of movement are possible with thicker discs, and the facet joints are structurally larger than similar joints in any other spinal areas. The large gliding motions which are possible in the neck allow its high levels of mobility in the compromise between mobility and stability in the spine.

The upper two vertebrae, the atlas and the axis, are very different from the remaining five cervical vertebrae, and they are specialised to serve the function of support and movement for the skull. The junction between the atlas (the C1 vertebra) and the axis (the C2 vertebra) is endowed with a rotatory type of structure, making up a significant proportion of all the rotation which occurs in the neck. The movements of the neck are very great, including flexion, extension, rotations and side flexions, allowing us to place our faces in any combination of degrees and position to perform many functional activities.

The underlying stability of the cervical spine is aided by the thoracic spine underneath it, also providing increased mobility. Without the contribution to its ease of motion from the thorax the neck would suffer increased forces where it meets the stiffer and heavier parts at each end, the thoracic spine and the skull. The neck projects from the thoracic spine up to the exposed and heavy head, the surrounding muscles acting like guy ropes to maintain it in a stabilised position under load and without shaking. It’s a hard job as the head weighs a lot and is forward of the gravity centre so the muscular systems must have good strength and endurance to keep the head where we want it.

The neck flexor muscles, situated anterior to the neck, do not have a lot of work to do as they only really function strongly in getting up from lying down. It is a different story for the extensor muscles behind the neck as they have the job of keeping the head up for the whole day without tiring, only showing their function when we get tired in a train when sitting and our head flops forward as the extensors turn off. While balancing the forces applied to the neck and maintaining posture is their key function they also produce levels of compressive forces.

Jonathan Blood Smyth, member of the Physiotherapy Site, writes articles about Physiotherapy, back pain, orthopaedic conditions, neck pain, injury management and physiotherapists in Oxford. Jonathan is a superintendant physiotherapist at an NHS hospital in the South-West of the UK.

Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/the-neck-977207.html

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