I've been asked to share the exercises I was given to do by The NHS physio I saw after being referred by my GP for osteoarthritis. My symptoms were decreased mobility left & right and up & down in my neck, with stiffness and pain, plus being woken in the night in pain and having to support my head into a new position with my hands as it was too painful to use my neck muscles. The exercises are in 2 parts: 2 to increase mobility 1 to strengthen the neck muscles Mobility Side to side Sit upright in a chair looking straight ahead. Put the index and middle fingers of your right hand on the right side of your jaw. Use your right arm to turn your neck to the left as far as you can so the movement is powered using your arm muscles not your neck and shoulder muscles, then return to the central position so you're looking straight ahead again. Repeat using the left arm turning your neck to the right. Up and down Still sitting upright and looking ahead put your thumb under your chin and push upwards with your thumb using your arm muscles rather than the neck and shoulders so you end up looking up as high as possible without moving your eyes, then return to the central pisition looking straight ahead. Next put your hand flat on the top of your head and pull down with your arm to get your chin on/close to your chest. Again return to the central position looking straight ahead. with both mobility exercises the neck and shoulder muscles must stay as relaxed as possible. Strength. This is to strengthen the shoulder muscles. Stand upright, legs slightly apart hands down by your side. With a dumb bell in each hand lift the dumbells upwards using the shoulder muscles NOT the arm muscles, the arms must remain hanging straight down and relaxed. Then lower the arms to the start position Do the 3 exercises once a day Initially do each of the 3 exercises 10 times a day. For the strength exercise initially use a 1kg weight - a 1 L plastic pop bottle will do. Build this up gradually, I was told to do this a month apart between consultations to 15, 20, 25 and finally 30 repetitions for each exercise. Once at 30 after another month if you feel strong enough you can increase the dumbbell weights to 2kg each. The physio said there was not much point to increase beyond the 2kg If you don't have time to do all 3 exercises each day or are not feeling like doing all 3 prioritise the strength exercise. I tend to do all 3 each day unless I suffer in the night. i if I think I've over done things when I will then have a day off or just do the strength exercise. It's a bit of suck it and see which works best for you. My mobility is now far better than it was and the pain when turning is much reduced, as is the night time neck pain. It's a chronic condition, so there's no cure but it's far better than it was and I know what to do to manage it. I find 1 ibuprofen tablet and 1 cocodamol help on the odd occasion I'm suffering more than usual if for instance I'm going for a ride or playing golf, but this isn't something I take regularly. I was also told this was something I needed to keep doing as if I stopped and reverted back to how I was before, any recovery would take longer and wouldn't be as good as I'd managed so far. here's the dumbells I use. https://www.argos.co.uk/product/7636738?clickPR=plp:14:43
