Do you suffer from headaches on a regular basis? If so, you’re not alone. Many people deal with the pain and discomfort of headaches every day. While there are many different ways to manage headache pain, osteopathy can be an effective option for some people. In this blog post, we will discuss how osteopathy can help manage the pain of headaches, why they happen, and how to stop them from occurring in the future.
Headaches are common complaints, with statistics showing that 96% of the population have suffered from some form of headache, 4 out of 5 have had a “tension type” headache, with 1 in 7 suffering from a migraine. Fortunately, over 99% of headaches that cause people to go to A&E are diagnosed as nothing sinister.
What causes headaches?
The stress factors that commonly predispose our patients to headaches include:
- Posture: How you stand, walk and sit all affect the muscular balance around your spine. Certain postures (such as being sat at a desk in front of a screen) are often responsible for contributing to headaches.
- Diet: Too much sugar in a meal leads to a surge in insulin production as the body tries to get the excess out of the blood and into your cells. This heightened insulin response can then lead to a “low” as the blood sugar levels crash and you become hypoglycaemic. This hypoglycaemia has been shown to lead to vasoconstriction (contraction) in the small blood vessels in the brain and is thought to be partly responsible for headaches and symptoms that feel like a migraine.
- Hydration: If you don’t drink enough during the day, dehydration may cause vasoconstriction of the blood vessels in the brain, which in turn causes the headache symptom.
How does osteopathy help headaches?
Generally, patients come to our practice with headaches fall into two groups; those who come because of their headaches and those that have developed headaches as a result of a problem elsewhere.
Regardless of the nature of the headache, we always seek to make an accurate diagnosis identifying the cause of the pain. We do this by taking a comprehensive medical and general health case history, spending time understanding you and your lifestyle so we can identify any other stress that may be contributing to the symptoms.
Peer=reviewed evidence shows that osteopathic techniques are safe and effective in the treatment of “cervicogenic” (those that are caused by neck tension) headaches and migraines.
As osteopaths, we treat cervicogenic headaches by focusing on manipulative techniques, such as manual spinal adjustments and manipulation of the neck and upper back. The aim of this is to improve cervical mobility and encourage better posture, which should help to remove the factors that contribute to your headaches. We supplement the treatment with functional exercises to stretch or strengthen muscle groups around the spine,
If you have been suffering from an increase in headaches recently, whether they be a mild discomfort or the debilitating pain of migraines, we have the medical knowledge and confidence to provide you with a diagnosis and treatment plan to alleviate your symptoms or give you best advice as to how to proceed if we feel we cannot help.
We offer expert headache treatment in Honiton, Staines, Sidmouth, Epsom, Wellington, Cullompton, Tiverton, and Ottery.
