We are going to break this information down into two categories: 1. When should you schedule an office visit to see a doctor? 2. When should you see a doctor immediately? Schedule an office visit: Call your doctor if you have neck pain that: Worsens despite self-care Radiates down your arms or legs Is accompanied by headache, numbness, or tingling Is so bad that it interferes with normal activities or sleeping Gets worse or lasts for several weeks despite home treatment Comes with tingling in any part of your body Comes with urinary or bowel incontinence Coincides with the development of headaches Muscle weakness. Weakness in an arm or leg or trouble walking may be a sign of a more serious problem Seek emergency medical care: Call 911 or your local emergency number, or have someone drive you to the emergency room if you have severe neck pain that is associated with: Traumatic injury. Examples include car collisions, diving accidents, head injuries, or falls. You need to rule out a possible bone fracture. High fever. If you have severe neck pain with a high fever, you might have meningitis, an infection of the membrane covering your spinal cord and brain. Severe, persistent headache. Or a headache accompanied by nausea and weakness. Nausea or vomiting Rash Sensitivity to light Racing or irregular heartbeat Difficulty breathing Pain or numbness radiating down the arms Pain in the chest or jaw Start the full Neck Pain Relief Program here.  Includes all videos and printable guide sheets: https://www.bobandbrad.com/health-programs/neck-pain-relief-program Image Provided by AnatomyStuff Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in November 2024. For the original video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39-d_cy_GwU Brad: Well, today we're going to discuss shoulder pain with five actual viewers. They reached out to us, and we're going to give them options on how to treat it. Mike, do you have more on that? Mike: We have carefully looked through their questions and decided the best options for them, so let's get to it. Brad: Should we go to our first viewer? Mike: Yeah, so let's go to our first question. So this comes from @rhondawatt9509. " What can I do at home to help my impingement of the shoulder, please ?" Brad: Well, that's a good question, Rhonda. And I really like your name. I was just wondering, Watt, is your last name because maybe it has to do with wattage, which is the electrical unit of power. She's a very strong person. Just making a little humor there. Rhonda, let's get to the problem at hand. Typical impingement symptoms. Let's talk about that first. Oftentimes, it's a single point pain where you can point to it, oftentimes, right there, not always, but it's pretty typical. Mike, another one? Mike: Typically, what happens is when you start lifting your arm, and you get about level with your shoulder, either in front of you or out to the side, it becomes painful. Sometimes people can push through the pain, and then it doesn't hurt as much, and then when they come back down, it might kind of catch again, but then you go through, and it's not painful again. Brad: Right. That's known as painful arc syndrome, quite common. Another thing, just reaching back to scratch your head or comb your hair in the back can be very painful. Now, a typical do-it-yourself treatment that we can do. We're going to talk about those. Should we go to the first one? Mike: The first one you can try is called cross-friction massage. You can just use your fingers for this, or if you happen to have a massage gun or tool, you can use that as well. What you wanna do with cross friction is you find the tendon or the painful area if it's in your shoulder up here, and the tendons run down this way, obviously depending upon where they're going, but you're going to go the opposite direction. I'm pressing kind of firmly here, so it might be a little tender. You'll just do this for one to two minutes. You can go up to five and just kind of press. It's gonna be uncomfortable, but when you're done, it should feel better. What you're doing is getting a lot of blood flow to the tendons and your rotator cuff, which carry the nutrients to help heal it faster. Brad: Right, now this is common with when you have that painful arc syndrome, that supraspinatus tendon is typically the one that we're dealing with. Your fingers will actually get sore, unless you have really strong hands. If you happen to have a massage gun, they work great for this particular treatment. Use the ball attachment. So I'm going to take that, and we're not going to go like this and beat into the tendon. We're going to go with the ball, you have to have the ball on, go sideways, and go across it like this. Feels good. Brad: If it gives you sharp pain, you need to not do it. It's too early. Do this for a minute or two. You'll have a good response to it, and it'll feel good after you're done. Let's go to another common treatment. Mike: Another option you can try is simply hanging. You can use a pull-up bar. These are hanging handles. Whatever you have around the house, you can grab onto comfortably, and what you're going to do is not hang all the way down, but just drop, stretch your shoulders above your head like this. Notice my feet are still on the ground. I'm getting a good stretch here. You can hold this for a time. You can go 15, 30 seconds if it feels too much, you can go up to two to five minutes if you really want, as long as it feels good, and just hang. Over time, if you feel comfortable and you're strong enough, you can lift your feet off the ground. You're going to get more stretching and distraction in the shoulder joint, but it's not necessary. Brad: That's right. Again, I want to emphasize, just do that cautiously, particularly the first time or two. Mike: We should mention, though, if you are short and you can't reach, just take a stick of sorts, we have the Booyah Stik , whatever you have at your house, and then reach up as far as you comfortably can with the painful side. Then just kind of lean into it. You can get a similar feeling. It's not quite the amount of force or pull, but we realize some people can't actually get their arm way above their head to start. Brad: Right, now if you do use a stick and you find it slipping on the chair or whatever, simply take your shoe off, put it in there, and it allows you to grip. Really nice little solution. And lastly, we do want to talk about some of these. This is a typical therapy treatment that works on the posterior part of the shoulder and improves posture. You simply are going to pull back with your hands going down to your belt or to your belt line or just below the belt line where your pockets are, and watch me squeeze my shoulder blades back behind me and think about your chest going out. There we go. So again, posture and rotator cuff muscles, putting them back in place where they need to be, so the joint lines up to minimize that impingement. It's a nice, traditional exercise. Mike: It's good to do all three of those because first is massaging, then we're stretching, then we're strengthening, which all work in conjunction to help with impingement. Brad: That's right. Good luck with those, and I have a feeling you're going to find these very helpful. Mike: This next question comes from Laura Johnson. We're going to condense it a bit because it's kind of wordy. Essentially, she was unloading some bark from her truck, and she started getting some shoulder pain. Now, whenever she reaches up into the cupboard for things or puts her jacket on, she's getting a lot of pain in her shoulder joint itself. Her pain is not in her shoulder blade. Brad: Alright, Laura Johnson, sorry to hear about your pain. You have the typical what we call Weekend Warrior Syndrome, out working very aggressively on something you'll probably have a passion for, working hard, then you have the symptoms you talk about. Very typical. Alright, Laura, before we get onto the exercises that are going to help you out, I do want to address this for other people. If you do tolerate ibuprofen, I think a good way to approach it is take the amount for you, three times a day for three days in a row. I've talked to a couple of different doctors, and they really like that. I like it because you don't overdo it, and if it's going to do you some good, it will do it in that amount of time. Now, the first exercise, there are two ways to do it. Mike's going to show the option with a resistance band , and I'm going to show the same option with a dumbbell, lying on my side. So we're going to pretend that I have a right shoulder problem. Mike, are you going to do it with the left shoulder? Mike: I'm going to do the left shoulder. Brad: Go ahead. You show them your tips first. Mike: So this is an often-neglected or weaker muscle group in your shoulder. We're going to work on external rotation. All that is is bringing your arm out to your side like this. Notice my elbow is staying tight. I'm putting a towel here so I don't cheat. A lot of people start doing this. This is not what we want. Keep the towel there. Rotate out. Any band you have will work. You can do three sets of 10 to 15 reps over time as long as this feels good, slow, and controlled. And do that every other day at least. Brad: There you go. Nice job, Mike. Now, if you do not have that, but you have a can of soup or anything that weighs about a pound. I'm using the three-pound dumbbell here. That's probably going to be a little too strong for a lot of people, but the mechanics are like this: elbow against the ribs. Start down here and then come up with a 90-degree bend at the elbow. So we're not down here doing this or this. It's this. Clean motion, good control, again up to 10. You will feel these muscles right back in here. Those posterior rotator cuff muscles get fatigued. Again, there should be no pain involved with this. Mike: The next tip we have is when you are reaching up into the cupboards to put something away, make sure the object is close to your body. Say, I don't know why you'd put a stick in the cupboard, but this is what I'm holding right now. If you're far away like this, going up, this is a lot harder and a lot more challenging on your shoulder. If you have it close to you and then you're lifting it up, it's closer to your center of gravity, making it easier and putting less strain on your shoulders. Brad: That's right, you can actually do that when you're putting a cup into the cupboard. Try it closer to you and get it in, and then try it with an outstretched arm. Do it where it's much less painful. It's an interesting concept. The last thing is, this is one of Bob's. I think he actually invented this stretch. He had impingement, and he had extremely good luck with it. There are two different ways to do it. One is with the stick, a four or five-foot-long stick. Works well with something that's smooth that slides up against your back. Go ahead. You know the chicken wing? Mike: I know the chicken wing. Brad: Excellent. Mike: So, what you're going to do if you're a beginner is to help if you struggle reaching behind your shoulder when you're putting on a coat, shirt, or whatever. So what you do is start low if you're on a stick. And the first trick is to just pull the stick up your back further, do what you can tolerate. Some people may be down here, others may be up higher. Once you're here, for more of a stretch, if you can get up here comfortably, is the chicken wing, which Bob does. So I pull the stick, and I'm getting more of a stretch. Really feel it in my shoulder capsule there, and it gets a nice, good stretch like this. If this hurts at all, you don't have to do it. Just working your arm up your back will help, and Brad will show another variation you can try. Brad: That's right. Just make sure you don't do this if it hurts. This is one of those things that you need to, it has to be healed a little bit along the way. You can do this method with a belt. You put it and have a loop here. Put it on your wrist. And a shiny belt works better because it slides over your clothing, and then you work it up here. The left is my sore shoulder. Simply relax and allow it to slide up. A little stretch pain is okay, but no sharp pain, absolutely. We actually had a patient scheduled for surgery. We had her do this exercise. The surgery was canceled. It was very successful, and her shoulder got better. This wasn't the only exercise, but it was one of the primary ones that was working. Mike: And you can do with a towel if you want. Like I was showing. Brad: There you go. Excellent. Alright, good luck with your shoulder. I think we've got some good options for you. Again, remember, listen to exactly how we did it and showed you. Mike: Our next question comes from @TheresaWagar. " My right shoulder is often sore when I wake up in the morning. How can I sleep differently as a side sleeper? " Brad: Theresa, you're in luck. We have helped many people, side sleepers, get through the night with shoulder pain, and what you are going to need to do is have an abundance of pillows. So go to the store, buy some pillows, take them from your children, your friends, whoever it may be. You'll see you'll need three or four. When you're lying on your side, if you sleep... Let's see, does she say if she sleeps on her sore side or not? Mike: Well, you can do both. Brad: There you go. Mike: So give me that pillow, though, because I want one for my head. Brad: Yep. Mike: So first off, you want to make sure you have an adequate amount of pillows to take pressure off your shoulder in general, even if this is your good shoulder. So, for example, if you were to sleep on your painful shoulder, correct the pillow height for your neck. This will be different for everyone. Maybe you need one, maybe you need three. Then we're going to create a little canal here, and this is where my painful shoulder is going to rest. Now, notice when I start rolling onto it, I feel more pressure on my shoulder. If I'm slightly at an angle, there's less pressure. This pillow helps take some of the pressure off the shoulder joint as well as these. Mike: So if you need to sleep on that side for whatever reason, this is a way you can try. Another good suggestion is to have something under your knees, because that gets uncomfortable too if your bony knees are hitting each other like that. Brad: Right, and a common complaint is with people, "Oh, when I lie on my side, I'll get uncomfortable after a couple of hours and inherently shift." But if you use a pillow between the knees, it's gonna allow you to feel more comfortable. It's amazing how much better that feels. Mike, I do want to give her one little tip. Now, if you do have the right number of pillows here, so your head is in a neutral alignment, and it's not tilting down, typically it's two pillows for a lot of people. That shoulder right here, I've done this with a lot of patients. I say just slide that shoulder like that. It tips you back that way a little bit, but it really unloads that shoulder joint. And then you don't have to make the Erie Canal with the pillow here. But try it both ways, see what works best for you, and I think you'll find this very, very helpful for your sleeping. Mike: Can I have my pillows back? Brad: Oh, sorry. Yes. Mike: So, what you can do, because most side sleepers like to change sides, is you need to prop it up even when your bad arm is up top. Brad: Oh, I forgot about this. Mike: So, place one pillow under your arm, and you can put another pillow angled, get it kind of under your armpit, and this will help put a little gap in your shoulder there. Oftentimes, this can relieve some pain you may be having as well. Obviously, if you're comfortable like this, you can do that. But most of the time, people need a little bit of a gap in their shoulder there, and it makes it more comfortable. Brad: Yeah, and that's with the painful shoulder on top. Mike: Yes. Brad: Yeah. And again, I always say put one between the knees too. Mike: You're a pillow monster. Brad: Yeah, so you've got one, two, three, four. Yeah, you'll need five pillows. Thank you and good luck. I really think this is gonna help you out. Mike: Our next question comes from @bh-6. " My left shoulder/neck always seems to bother me, and I have knots. I'm right-handed. Lately, I've had higher area neck pain. I'm 47, play tennis, and I do lift boxes and move boxes at work from time to time. I go to stretch u and do stretch and cryo sessions once every other week. " They would like some more suggestions. Brad: Well, you're in luck. I think we've got some good suggestions for you. I picked you because I liked your initials. BH, you know Brad Heineck? Yeah, we've got something in common. Mike: I think I've heard of him. Brad: Anyways, your scenario, I really want you to stand up and turn around, Mike. We're going to have to do it on the right. But it's the other shoulder. I really think your shoulder blade is actually depressed, physically, not psychologically. It's down, and that's stretching out the muscles from the neck to the scapula. And what we need to do is elevate that shoulder blade, take the stress off of there, it's going to help with the neck pain. Brad: Maybe you're having some headaches as well, and we need to stretch out the muscles here. So this is a nice problem because it's not really hard to fix. You just need to do these two exercises on a consistent basis. Mike is good at showing these, and I'll watch and keep my mouth shut if I can. Mike: So we got these from our friend, Rick Olderman , who's a PT, so check out his work if you're interested more in this. The first one is basically a child's pose stretch. We call it a prayer stretch. What you're going to do is keep your shoulders in place, and then I'm going to sit my butt on my heels. Notice as I go into this position, my shoulders start naturally lifting above me, and I feel a stretch. If you're not feeling much of a stretch, you can extend your hands out more. Hold this for five to 10 seconds, come back up, and you're going to repetitiously keep doing that. Mike: Now, if your left side is more painful, what you can try to do is reach over to your right hand and get a little more stretch there. I would do this 10 times each day. Brad: Yeah, so, BH, just so you know, that stretch is, again, moving that shoulder blade upwards, stretching the tight muscles out down here, and then you do this one first, follow it up by the strengthening exercise that we call the pinky exercise up against the wall. Mike, help them out. Mike: So, for this, you're going to need to find an open wall space, or you can do it on a closed door as well. So if it's just your left side, you can only do your left side. If you want to do both at the same time, it's not going to hurt anything. What you're going to do is pinky sides to the elbow are going to make contact with the wall the entire time. Now I'm going to slide my arms up the wall, and as I go up, I'm going to kind of shrug a little bit to help, and we're going to hold up top for five to 10 seconds, breathe, and then slowly come back down. Just make sure you're keeping contact with the wall the entire time. If you can only go a little way, then just do what you can and back down. Over time, you should be able to slide up more and really feel a stretch and activation of the shoulder blade muscles. Brad: Right, that whole idea of getting that shoulder up towards the left ear to strengthen the muscles here, to get that shoulder blade elevated where it needs to be, and get you out of that painful syndrome. All right, very good. Simple exercises. Just make sure you do them at least once a day. After you've done them for a while, do them twice a day, morning and evening, and it'll help accelerate the healing process. Mike: Our next question comes from @curiousone6129, " For what kinds of problems is PT preferable to shoulder replacement surgery? I have osteoarthritis. " Brad: Alright, I'm going to relate this to someone I know who has very similar symptoms. This person has bone-on-bone in one shoulder. They recommended shoulder replacement. He was not; he wasn't fond of that. Talked to me about it, I said go to the surgeon and talk to the surgeon personally at your next visit. They did. They came up with an option. Therapy exercises to strengthen the rotator cuff muscles and some stretches to help get that bone or the humeral head in position properly, along with an injection, that would be the surgeon's obvious discretion. In this particular case, the person, three weeks after the injection with therapy, is now doing very well. Swimming up to 2,000 yards, overhand. He was a very good swimmer to begin with. So it worked for that person. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but these are options. And if you're not happy with what your surgeon has to say, do not be afraid to get a second opinion. That is something a lot of people don't feel comfortable with, but I strongly recommend it. Get a surgeon who fits you and whom you feel comfortable with. Mike: Most of the time, with any shoulder injury, trying therapy first is not going to harm anything or do any worse. If it helps, good. If it doesn't help, then you always have surgery. Brad: Right. And actually, if you do have surgery, therapy before surgery is an excellent idea because it conditions the muscles and allows the range of motion, so you have better post-therapy results. Mike: Yeah, you're going to have therapy after surgery, too. Brad: There you go. Alright, good luck with your shoulder. I know arthritis is a big problem, and it's not fun to deal with. Alright, that was all five of them, Mike. Should we carry on? Mike: We should. If you want to check out more videos on shoulder pain, specifically impingement exercises, you can watch  " Absolute Best Shoulder Impingement Exercises (Self-Treatments) ." Brad: There you go. 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Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in November 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/cCnTEh9B2M0 Mike: Today, we are diving into five common beliefs about back pain. Brad: That's right. And as the title says, you'll probably be shocked at which ones are myths and which ones are actually true, which may be all of them. Mike: Now, for each of these myths, we want to envision you going through this circumstance. However, for the purpose of the article, we're going to use a hypothetical person, and his name is Alan. Brad: Mike, let's go to myth number one. Can we do that? Mike: We can. Number one, manual labor is harder on your back than sitting. So in the situation with Alan, he works a desk job, sits most of the day, and he thought he was fine because he was not lifting any heavy objects at work, but he was still having back pain. Brad: That's right. Now this has been proven time after time. Prolonged sitting can actually be harder on your back than lifting, depending on the situation. But there's no doubt that prolonged sitting is not good for the lower back. Mike: Now, if you do happen to have a desk job, it's essential to walk and take standing breaks throughout the day. What you can try to do is, after each meal, maybe just take a little five to 10-minute walk, and it can help release some tension or back pain you may be experiencing. And a tip you can try is actually standing and walking with your hands behind your back like this. It helps encourage a nice upright posture and gets you out of that flex position you often get stuck in while working at a desk. Brad: There you go. Let's go to myth number two with Alan. Mike: Avoiding exercise is best for back pain. Now, Alan thought that if he didn't exercise his back because it was already hurting, his back would hurt more if he started exercising. Brad: And actually, in most cases, that couldn't be farther from the truth. The key is, which exercises should you be doing? Find the appropriate ones that don't irritate it, but help it, and do those. Mike: Now, obviously, if you went to therapy and have some specific exercises from your therapist, you can do those. But other activities, such as walking, swimming, or specific things provided for you, are going to be most beneficial. Brad: That's right, and you can find a lot of those at Bob and Brad on our YouTube channel , and look for back pain exercises. There are a lot of different ones. We refer to Stuart McGill and what he recommends. Walking. We're going to get more into this. He's a world-renowned expert in back pain. Mike: Myth number three is rest is best for back pain. Now Alan kept resting his back, lying down, not doing much because he wanted to avoid injuring it again, but actually, it may not help with his recovery. Brad: All right, there may be certain situations right when you injure your back, and you're in that acute phase where everything hurts, and you're just very uncomfortable, then I'll rest with a cold pack. Things like that may be appropriate, but within a day or two, you need to start moving and find out what movements like we had just covered. Mike: So most experts say moderate activity is beneficial. No, we're not saying go back to lifting heavyweights in the gym. If you happen to do that right away. But just getting up and moving, a gentle range of motion. Can any activities that feel good be beneficial for you? Brad: That's right. So we call it light movements. Doing things gently, carefully. And of course, you're going to watch your body mechanics and keep that back protected while you're moving. Use good judgment. Mike: Myth number four is that strengthening will solve all your back pain issues. In this scenario, Alan is feeling better, and he thinks that if I just get a stronger back, I won't have any more pain. Brad: That's right. Now this has been known not to be true. If we look at Stewart McGill's work, he addresses this very specifically, that strengthening your back is partially important, but even more important is spine stability. Keeping your spine in good posture and good body mechanics while you're moving it, as well as motor control, all relate to monitoring your spine position, whether you're in a static posture like sitting or standing, or moving, bending, and lifting. And that gets more detailed as we look into it. Mike: And it's important to build up your endurance for your back. Say you're just getting back into working out and weightlifting. Start with lower, lighter-weight controlled repetitions. Don't do too much too soon because often as we start fatiguing, our mechanics get worse and worse. So build up slowly over time. Get that endurance going. Brad: That's right. Mike: Myth number five is that stretching will save your back. Now, in this scenario, Alan thought that if I started stretching some more, it would help relieve my pain, and I wouldn't have to deal with it anymore. Brad: That's right. Now stretching can help your back if you do it appropriately. But one of the big things that Stuart McGill mentions is doing stretching early in the morning, that's a big no-no because your discs actually absorb fluid or imbibe, they call it. And they're more susceptible to injury, particularly if the stretches are not the ones you should be doing. For example, fingertips to toes, which a lot of people feel is a good low back stretch. In this case, that wouldn't be particularly good in the morning. Mike: So any type of stretching or movement where you have excessive rounding of the back or anything where you're working on your hamstrings a lot, because they're connected right to your back. Avoid those things as well, early on. Make sure you do proper warmup, and then later in the day you can get into those as long as you're feeling good. Brad: That's right. Now we did want to go back to strengthening exercise. We said you don't need to strengthen or don't strengthen a lot, but there are three strengthening exercises that Stuart McGill does encourage, and he specifically outlines these. We're not going to go through them in this video, but you can find them in the video,   " The Best 3 Core Exercises To Do Daily For Seniors ." Mike: And if you like this video, make sure to subscribe if you haven't already, and leave a comment down below if any of these tips helped you out. Brad: That's right, take care of your back. We all want to see you back in the goal. No pun intended. 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Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in November 2024. For the original video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trjvLKmfFEk Mike: Today, we're diving into the truth about bulging and herniated discs, what you really need to know to understand the pain you are having. Brad: That's right. So if we look here, we've got something that's going to make a lot of sense after you see the video. Brad: And we're going to show an additional exercise that we did not do before, which is going to help with one-sided sciatica. Mike: So we're actually going to go back in time and let Bob and Brad explain this very thoroughly. So here's a time-traveling warp. Brad: Woo-ooh-ooh-ooh-woo. Bob: Hey, we're going to be talking about the big lie, which actually comes in part from this book called "Paindemic" written by Dr. Melissa Cady . She's a doctor of osteopathy. And she wrote a chapter in this book called "The Disc," I believe it is. And that chapter alone might be worthwhile getting this book read. Brad: Right. It's a good chapter. And if you have back pain, and you're thinking about getting an MRI, you really should read the information. Bob: Right, MRI, or if you're thinking about having surgery, you definitely want to. So, we'll talk more about this book in future videos. But right now, let's talk about the big lie. All right, first off, let's say you're having back pain. You go in, and you have an MRI, and they find out you have a bulging disc or a herniated disc. And you're going, "Oh my God." Brad: Right. You're all excited. I'd better get surgery. Bob: I'd better have surgery. Brad: Right. Bob: And the thing is, that's probably the last thing you want to do, because the problem is what you'll find out in this study. We're going to show a couple of studies. It'll show that, is that most people at a certain, well, some people at a certain age have a bulging disc, and they have no pain at all. So, the fact, let's go right to this chart, Brad. Brad: Sure. I think that's a good idea, Bob. Bob: Okay? So, if you have a bulging disc, what they did is they did MRIs on people who were having no symptoms whatsoever. They had no signs or symptoms of pain. Right? Brad: Yep. Bob: And they did it on people in their twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, sixties, and seventies. What they found out is that 30% of the people in their twenties had a bulging disc. Brad: No symptoms. Active people. Bob: No symptoms. Yeah. 40% in their thirties, no symptoms. Had a bulging disc. All the way up to when you're in your seventies, 77% of people had a bulging disc. But no pain. Brad: And you can see it just gradually goes up with age. Bob: Yeah. So it's a part of aging. Brad: Right. Bob: It's a deterioration process. Brad: It's like getting gray hair. Bob: It's like getting gray hair. Exactly. Or putting on a few extra pounds. So, are you going to have surgery when you get gray hair, Brad? Brad: No. Bob: Okay. The other thing is, and we don't have a chart for this one, was for disc protrusions, which is really a disc herniation. We're going to show this on the model in a little bit. But on the disc herniation, the same was true, Brad. At age 20, 29% of the people had a disc herniation and had no symptoms. And all the way up to 70, I'm sorry, they had one for 80 years old, all the way up to people in their eighties, 43% had a disc protrusion or herniation, and no pain. Brad: Right. So if you think about it, and you've got back pain, and you may have had that herniation in your disc for 10 or 15 years prior without any symptoms, and you get back pain, it may be from a different cause. You get an MRI, they see the herniation or the protrusion, and point the finger at that. You have the surgery, get it taken care of, and you still have the pain. Bob: Because it wasn't from the herniation. Brad: Right. Bob: So we'll talk a little more about that. But right now, Brad's going to show what a bulging disc would be like. First off, you have the disc itself, right? Brad: Right, well, let's look over at our Napoleon here. Bob: Napoleon Bonaparte. Brad: We're going to look at L5 and L4, two lower vertebrae. This red bulge here represents a bulging disc or a herniated disc. Brad: And now, if we look at these two vertebrae, and we're going to take them out and show a model of those, this cup represents one of the vertebrae, and this is the other. The green ball represents the actual disc itself. Brad: So, this is a healthy disc here. It moves; it has some mobility in it so that you can move your spine as we all do. But if you get a bulge, right where my finger's pointing, right there's a bulge starting. Okay? Brad: And particularly if it's in the back, where most bulges are, when you bend forward, it oftentimes makes it worse. Or when you lift weights with poor body mechanics and sit with poor posture, and that bulge could eventually, boom, turn into a herniation. Bob: Yeah, herniation is when some of the inner material of the disc actually spills out back. Behind there. Brad: Right. A disc is just like this. You can see there's material in there that's, it's liquid, kind of a thicker liquid, but it can come out and cause that bulge. And that's a problem that you do not want to have. Bob: Well, it's a problem that is not really a problem unless it pushes out the back and hits a nerve, Brad. Brad: Right. Exactly. I guess what I meant to say was when it gets this far out, and it's extreme and creating pain and whatnot. Bob: So, when should you have surgery? There are times you should. Brad: Right. Bob: One is if this bulge or herniation is pushing against your spinal cord, which is running right down this hole here. Brad: Right. Bob: The other one is if it's hitting one of the nerves coming off on the sides. If it hits that nerve, it could actually give you some pain down your leg. And if it's causing you foot drop, Brad, where you actually started getting weakness in the foot, that's usually a sign that you're getting pressure on the nerve. Brad: Right. Bob: You know, it's pushing on the nerve itself. The other time, so really three instances. One is that it pushes on your spinal cord, and it'll show up on the MRI. You'll be able to see that. Two is pushing on one of the spinal nerves. Or three, is there an actual mass there? I mean, if you have cancer or some type of mass growing. Brad: Right. Sometimes it's benign, and they get in there and remove it, and it takes care of the problem very quickly. Bob: Or a blood clot. There could even be a blood clot growing on the spinal cord. You know, Dr. Cady, she said she knew plenty of physicians and surgeons who would avoid back surgery like the plague. That was one of her quotes. So, it's really something you want to consider that you really want to try some aggressive physical therapy way before you try surgery. Brad: Right. Bob: It really probably is the last case scenario. So again, don't get distraught if you're seeing a lot of things on your x-ray, as far as which is just showing general aging, which can be a disc protrusion or disc herniation. Brad: Yeah, I think Bob meant to say MRI. Bob: What did I say? Brad: X-ray. Bob: Oh, X-ray. Well, X-rays show some of that stuff too. Brad: All right, now that was a really good example of how, or a model of how that disc can actually herniate or bulge. Good visual. Let's say the bulge is on the left side, which is causing pain in the sciatica down the left leg. Mike, what's the exercise that we learned from Rick Olderman in the recent years or two, how to correct it? Mike: So, what you could do is go to the top of a door frame, a pull-up bar, or you can use a stick if you're shorter and can't reach high enough. So what I'm going to do is go on the side that is painful, reach my hand away from me, and then I'm going to lean into the doorway. I'm going to feel a good stretch here. If you're not feeling much stretch, you can try bending your knees a little bit more, and it's really pulling, and that is taking stress off of the herniated disc, relieving some pain you may be experiencing. Brad: That's right. Now, if you don't have, if you cannot reach the doorway, and you have a stick four to five feet tall, I am using the Booyah Stik , and you can grip it so that your hand does not slide down. That's really critical. And the other key thing is, if you don't have a rubber tip, it may slip. And if you're using a countertop or a table, you do not want it to slip off because it will not be a good experience. So put your shoe on there, and that'll take that off and give a good grip. And you can see I'm just, there we go. My left knee's bending. I'm feeling that stretch on the left side. Monitor the pain or the symptoms, tingling, or numbness down the left leg. If the leg is feeling better as a result of doing this or while you're doing it, you know you're right on target for the correct treatment. Mike: Now, if you want to check out more videos on back pain, you can watch " Six Best Low Back Stretches for Max Pain Relief. " Brad: Every position. For this week’s Giveaway, visit :  https://bobandbrad.com/giveaways Bob and Brad’s Products Pain Management: A2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) A2 Pro Massage Gun A7 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy Back Massager C2 Massage Gun (US) C2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy C2 Plus Massage Gun with Heat C2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head C2 Ultra Massage Gun D5 Pro Massage Gun D5 Pro Plus Massage Gun (with heat) D5 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) D6 Pro Massage Gun D6 Plus Massage Gun with Heated Head D6 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head D6 Pro Max+ Massage Gun D6 Ultra Massage Gun EyeOasis 2 Eye Massager EyeOasis 2 Plus Eye Massager with Remote EyeOasis 3 Eye Massager Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling EZBack Go Back, Neck, & Shoulder Massager EZBack Massager   EZBack Massager With Remote EZBack Pro Back Massager EZBack Prime Back Massager Fit Glide Foot Massager G100 Pro Vibration Therapy Massager Hand Massager HandSpa Pro Hand Massager Holy Cowabunga Cream   iMaster Pro Massage Chair iNeck Pro Neck and Shoulder Massager Knee Glide   Lite Foot Massager M7 Plus Mini Massage Gun with Heat Therapy Posture Pad Q2 Mini Massage Gun (US) Q2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head Q2 Plus Mini Massage Gun  Q2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head Q2 Ultra Massage Gun sWAVE Massage Gun with Belt T2 Massage Gun  T2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) T2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head T2 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head TheraHeat Knee Brace TheraPanel 4 -Headed Massage Gun ThermoRed Heated Back Belt Weighted Heating Pad for Back Weighted Heating Pad For Neck and Shoulders Weighted Heating Pad-Long Heating Pad with Weighted Edge X6 Massage Gun with Stainless Steel Head X6 Pro Max Massage with Heat-Cold and Metal Head X6 Ultra Massage Gun Zero Pro Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling Fitness: Hanging Handles​ Pull Up System Resistance Bands​   Wall Anchor​ Stretching: Booyah Stik   Stretch Strap Bob & Brad Amazon Store   and other products Bob and Brad Love Check out our shirts, mugs, bags, and more in our Bob and Brad merchandise shop Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

Neck pain can vary from person to person in location and in intensity, depending on your diagnosis, age, and posture. However, here are some common locations of neck pain we see in patients. Initial pain is usually felt at the base of the neck or on one side of the neck or the other. As neck pain worsens, it is often felt in the upper trapezius (between the neck and shoulder) (one side or both sides). This is often an example of referred pain. Referred pain is pain that originates in one location (in this case, the neck) but spreads to other, more distant areas. As the pain worsens, a person may feel the pain in the neck, upper trapezius (between the neck and shoulder), and over the shoulder blade area. Some may also feel it between the shoulder blades. The pain may also begin to extend down the arm to the elbow. If you have a “pinched nerve” in the neck, also known as radiculopathy, you may experience pain further down the arm, past the elbow into the forearm, wrist, and hand. Symptoms of a pinched nerve may include numbness, tingling, burning, and even weakness. This leads us to an important point. Generally, the more a neck or neck pinched nerve is irritated, the further down the neck and body (upper back/arms) the symptoms of pain, numbness, tingling, weakness, and/or burning may occur. Fortunately, the reverse is also true; as the nerve becomes less irritated, the symptoms generally improve in an ascending fashion. That is less pain, numbness, tingling, weakness, and/or burning in the hand or arm. This can help you gauge whether your self-treatments are helping. In most cases, when you have a pinched nerve in the neck, the s nerve is being compressed somewhere along the nerve. Common causes of compression include: 1. Disc. One of the soft jelly-like discs that are located between the bones (vertebrae of your neck) may be herniated, or ruptured, and pressing on one of the nerve roots, leading to possible pain, numbness, tingling, etc. 2. Degenerative changes in your spine, discs, or ligaments are often due to age, resulting in a smaller opening for the nerve roots to pass through. The smaller hole may cause increased pressure and irritation of the nerves. This may lead to spinal stenosis. 3. Compression over a nerve from a muscle in your neck. 4. In thoracic outlet syndrome , you can have a situation where the nerves (and blood vessels) coming from the neck get compressed between a person’s collarbone and first rib. Thoracic outlet syndrome will not be addressed in this video series. Start the full Neck Pain Relief Program here.  Includes all videos and printable guide sheets: https://www.bobandbrad.com/health-programs/neck-pain-relief-program Image Provided by AnatomyStuff Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in November 2024. For the original video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPTm_5hq1so&t=12s Brad: Man, the older I get, the worse my thumb hurts when I try to open the door. Mike: You are old. Anyway, if you're dealing with thumb pain, we're going to show you some good remedies. Brad: That's right. Plus, we're going to show you three exercises to strengthen it, so this type of thing doesn't happen in the future. It's one of those things that gets missed a lot in these videos with thumb problems. Mike: You're getting closer to me. Brad: Alright. The thumb, thumb pain. We're going to go back in time a little bit because we have a video that Bob and I made that is excellent. It's the best one on YouTube describing the anatomy and how the thumb works. Then we're going to come back and show you how to fix it and strengthen it. Mike: And we're so bad at time travel, we're going to use Dr. Who to help us right now. Brad: Oh, Dr. Who? Brad: So we're going to start, there's a little bone down here called the trapezium, and then the next one is your metacarpal, and then your phalange joint's up here. Not that you need to know that, but this joint down here could easily get missed. Bob: Yeah, and that is the one that I often see a lot of people have arthritis there. Brad: That's right. Bob: And it gets irritated, and it's the one that really bothers them. Brad: That's the one that allows your thumb to really have, you can do circles with your thumb very easily, and you work different motions, biplanar, we call it. Bob: You should not look at it, Brad. You should show them while you're doing this. Brad: Well, I didn't know which way they could see better, Bob, but that's a good point. So the first one, if you just take your thumb and go to your pinky, if you can go like this and touch your thumb to your pinky, we're getting one direction of that joint, and it's all working down in here. Right down in there. And you can do 10 to 15 reps of that. If it needs little help you when and you can't touch, you can help, and you can squeeze it, give a little, what we call passive range of motion. If it hurts, just bump into the pain and repeat that, okay? Brad: And as it goes out, you want to make sure you can open it up as well. And I'm pressing this direction to get that joint to go the opposite direction. Brad: So we're going this way and close it to the pinky and close it, and then we can give a little pressure and open it. The next one is thumb to the pointer finger. That would be the second digit. And we're going to, so you can't bring your finger to the thumb that's cheating. You have to try to keep the finger. Bob: Bring the thumb to the finger. Yep. Brad: Keep the finger straight, and the thumb's going to go up to the finger and back like that. So you make a little L, and then we close the L. Bob: Gotcha. Brad: Open, close. And you can give it a little stretch here. Usually, it's going to be the thumb away from the fingers; that's probably the tight direction. And we can give it a gentle stretch there. So work it back and forth 10 times. If we need a little more after that, you have to get it warmed up. We're going to stretch it manually with the other hand. Not too aggressively, you don't want to get too sore. And then circles, clockwise. Bob: Got it. Brad: Counter-clockwise. Get that joint working well, and you can actually get in here and grab the bone right here. Grab that metacarpal and work it this way as well. And get in and work these muscles around the thumb and get that circulation going, all in that base part of the thumb, instead of starting out here on the end of the thumb. Brad: And then we're going to work the MP joint and the IP joint in the thumb. Okay? The phalange joints, we call them. We're going to work those together. They only go one direction; they're a hinge joint, Bob. Bob: Sure. Brad: So it makes it much easier, less complicated to work with, and we're just going close or flex the thumb and then extend it and work it like that. Now I remember when I was younger, I could not flex. Bob: I was going to say, you don't have much flexion the way it is. Look at mine compared to his. Brad: Yeah. I could only go about 50% flexion. And then I could pop it past that and back and forth. Bob: Really? Brad: When I was just about five or six years old, I used to work at it; I'd go click, click, click. And I just kept doing it. I figured wear it through. Bob: And it did. You were a therapist even back then, Brad. Brad: Yeah. I remember doing it in church. I'd be getting bored, and I'd be clicking on my thumb. Going, "It's gotta get better sooner or later." Bob: How unusual is that? Brad: Sure enough, I said a prayer and then God took care of it. Bob: Strange things. Brad: But it is true that that was a real problem with both thumbs. I don't know what the deal is with that, but it works well now. So, you can put some pressure on here if you want to get further flexion, just like I was doing when I was a child. And then go back and you know, do 10 to 20 reps depending on how it feels. Bob: Can I show a little bit of an advanced technique there? Brad: Oh yeah, absolutely. Bob: This is a Mulligan technique and a little, maybe a little bit hard to follow. But what you're going to do, if you have pain in that first joint, what you want to do is you're going to slide, you're going to put one finger at the top inside, and one finger at the bottom ouside of the thumb, and the top one's going to push away from the hand, and the bottom one's going to push toward the hand, and while I'm doing that, I push, and then I bend the thumb. Brad: So he's trying to put a little pressure to make that joint go sideways. Bob: Right. Brad: Laterally. But you know, you're not going to break it or anything. Bob: No, no. Brad: Just some gentle pressure. Bob: Just a little pressure. And it's amazing how often if that thumb joint, that first one, is painful, sometimes that takes it away. If that doesn't work, you might go the opposite way. So I put the thumb up here, and the top outside finger pushes toward the hand, and the bottom inside finger is pushing away from the hand. I hope you're following up on this. This is a little bit complicated, but it's amazing to me how this often works on any finger, really. Brad: So he said Mulligan technique, from Brian Mulligan. Brian Mulligan was a physical therapist. Bob: In New Zealand. Brad: Yep. And is he still alive? Bob: I believe so. Brad: He's up there. Bob: Yeah, he's up there. We saw him how many years ago? Brad: Yeah, it was quite a while ago. And he looked old then. Bob: But he was a spirit, wasn't he? Brad: He was a real treat to work with. He was. Bob: He was fun. Brad: Whoa. Thank you for that little history lesson, Bob and Brad, in the past. Now we're in the present or back to the future, however you put it. Before we get into three exercises, I had this come to my attention from a person that I'm working with, some pain, and he happens to have a massage gun, and he has this little field goal head that goes on there, which I usually never use. And he said, "I really like that for massaging my thumb." And I thought, "What are you talking about?" And this is what he does, and he has found very good success with it. You're going to massage the muscle on each side of the thumb, and you go over the bone, right? We talked about previously in that history video, and you just work it in like this. Now, depending on the size of your thumb, it may or may not work, but I just wanted to show, because a lot of people do use massage guns now. And you can use it for that. Mike, you can also use it with the bullet head. Mike: You're going to get thenar eminence or this muscular area in between the joint here. You're not gonig to go right on the bone with this type of bullet head. You can pick either side like that. If you don't have a massage gun, you could certainly massage in there yourself. But if you're having thumb pain on both sides, that gets pretty troublesome. Brad: All right? And if you have a massage gun to use it for this particular purpose, it has to be a small or a mini massage gun, like this Q2 Massage Gun . Big ones will be too aggressive. Now let's get into the exercises. Now, after you've got things loosened up, as we just showed you, and you've got the thumb moving with less pain, what we need to do is strengthen it. So, like at the beginning, I'm trying to open the door, and all of a sudden, you're putting a lot of force into it. You have a little dislocation, which really hurts the arthritis in there. If you strengthen it after the range of motion exercises, much less potential to have that pain episode as I had. So, talk about the first one, Mike. Mike: The first one you're going to want to do, we just call it opposition in the therapy world. But we're just going to touch the thumb to the pinky because it's furthest away. This is going to work on your thumb range of motion without any resistance. Brad: That's right. Now this is my thumb that literally does hurt when I do things like that, and I can feel it right now. It's working that muscle. The right hand, no problem at all. The left hand definitely needs strengthening. Now we're going to work the opposite muscle group, and that's where the thumb goes back this way. Mike, can you talk about that? Mike: So in order to do this, you place your hand on the table or countertop, keep your palm in contact with the mat, and try to lift your thumb up as far as you comfortably can. Don't cheat and rotate your hand up. It's just working that little range of motion going the opposite direction. Brad: That's right. Again, it's not a lot of range of motion. But you will feel the muscle fatigue after 10 to 15 of these. And let's go to the next stage, a little more strengthening with some resistance. Mike: So you can use some sort of ball. It's going to have to be soft and squishy. A tennis ball would probably be too aggressive. Whatever you have lying around could work. So you're going to place it in the palm of your hand, and you're going to take your thumb, and you're just going to push your thumb into your palm like this. You can do 10 repetitions, hold it there for a few seconds, and squeeze down. Brad's got a little bit squishier ball; it's a little easier. So, depending upon your pain, pick what feels most comfortable for you. Brad: Yeah, these really work well, and they feel fun. They're just kind of fun to work with, in my opinion. Then we want to work the opposite range of motion. You can simply take a rubber band, as I have here. I'm going to hold it on my fingers, and we're just going to have a thumb motion, pulling out like this. And you'll definitely feel that you can see the tendons right here, the muscles that are doing the work. And again, between 10 and 20 of those. And again, you should have no sharp pain with this. If it is, your thumb's not ready for it. You need to rest a little bit. Brad: And the ultimate of the strengthening exercises. Mike: Number three is incorporating the whole hand. So again, have a ball, and you're going to essentially make a fist and squeeze the ball, closing your thumb as well as the rest of your fingers. You could do 10 repetitions of all of these. This would be the maximum progression of these exercises. Once that feels easy, you can work on extending either with a normal rubber band. Brad: Here, try it with the soft squishy ball ones. Mike: Well, this isn't very aggressive. There's just guts floating out from inside. Brad: But for some people, that's going to be very appropriate. Mike: Yes. Brad: So yeah, look, those are, you can get them pretty cheap, typically too. Mike: Now again, we want to focus on extension or opening the hand. So if you have a rubber band, you can use that. But as you see, as you go up, a rubber band normally kind of comes down like that. Brad has an actual tool. Brad: It works okay if you don't open up too wide. Mike: Yeah. Brad: There you go. Mike: Like this. If I open up all the way, then it goes down. Brad: Yeah, and you can purchase these that are made specifically for that, and that works very well. Mike: Just make sure you get one with low resistance or options. You don't want to go to the hardest one right away. Brad: This one, the black color usually has more resistance, and it is. That's quite a bit. I'd have to work quite a bit with this. I'm already getting tired. Alright. Alright, so good luck with getting your thumb moving with less pain, strengthening it so you can function better. Mike: If you want to check out more videos on trigger finger or trigger thumb, check out our video " Trigger Finger & Trigger Thumb; Everything You Need to Know to Fix. " Brad: There you go. Have fun and enjoy the day. For this week’s Giveaway, visit :  https://bobandbrad.com/giveaways Bob and Brad’s Products Pain Management: A2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) A2 Pro Massage Gun A7 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy Back Massager C2 Massage Gun (US) C2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy C2 Plus Massage Gun with Heat C2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head C2 Ultra Massage Gun D5 Pro Massage Gun D5 Pro Plus Massage Gun (with heat) D5 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) D6 Pro Massage Gun D6 Plus Massage Gun with Heated Head D6 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head D6 Pro Max+ Massage Gun D6 Ultra Massage Gun EyeOasis 2 Eye Massager EyeOasis 2 Plus Eye Massager with Remote EyeOasis 3 Eye Massager Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling EZBack Go Back, Neck, & Shoulder Massager EZBack Massager   EZBack Massager With Remote EZBack Pro Back Massager EZBack Prime Back Massager Fit Glide Foot Massager G100 Pro Vibration Therapy Massager Hand Massager HandSpa Pro Hand Massager Holy Cowabunga Cream   iMaster Pro Massage Chair iNeck Pro Neck and Shoulder Massager Knee Glide   Lite Foot Massager M7 Plus Mini Massage Gun with Heat Therapy Posture Pad Q2 Mini Massage Gun (US) Q2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head Q2 Plus Mini Massage Gun  Q2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head Q2 Ultra Massage Gun sWAVE Massage Gun with Belt T2 Massage Gun  T2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) T2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head T2 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head TheraHeat Knee Brace TheraPanel 4 -Headed Massage Gun ThermoRed Heated Back Belt Weighted Heating Pad for Back Weighted Heating Pad For Neck and Shoulders Weighted Heating Pad-Long Heating Pad with Weighted Edge X6 Massage Gun with Stainless Steel Head X6 Pro Max Massage with Heat-Cold and Metal Head X6 Ultra Massage Gun Zero Pro Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling Fitness: Hanging Handles​ Pull Up System Resistance Bands​   Wall Anchor​ Stretching: Booyah Stik   Stretch Strap Bob & Brad Amazon Store   and other products Bob and Brad Love Check out our shirts, mugs, bags, and more in our Bob and Brad merchandise shop Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

A pinched nerve in the neck occurs when pressure is applied to a nerve that is exiting the neck. The pressure can be from a disc, bone, muscle, tendon, or some other type of tissue. Continued pressure on a nerve can result in the following: 1. Pain in the neck that radiates into the arm, and possibly beyond the elbow. Pain may even radiate into the fingertips. 2. Hand, arm, or shoulder muscle weakness 3. Numbness or decreased sensation in the arm, wrist, or hand 4. Tingling, pins, and needles sensations (paresthesia) 5. Pain in the arm, wrist, and hand that is aggravated by neck movements 6. Feeling that the hand has fallen asleep The first three tests are designed to see if there is any stress on any of the three main nerves of the arm: median, ulnar, or radial. The image below conveys which area of the hand each nerve affects. Arm tension test (3 nerves) First, perform these 3 tests on your non-painful arm for comparison. The first test places tension on the median nerve. Median nerve tension test : Test the non-painful arm first. Extend your arm (elbow) out to the side of you. Turn the wrist outward so the palm is facing away from the body. Extend your wrist and laterally bend your neck away from the arm. Side-bend your neck away from the pain while extending the wrist and hand. Repeat the same test on the painful arm. If you cannot extend the elbow or the wrist without increased pain and/or symptoms, you have tested positive for the median arm tension test. Ulnar nerve tension test : Test the unaffected arm first. With arm out to the side, bend the elbow fully and extend the wrist. Make a circle with your thumb and pointer finger. Flip your hand palm up and see if able to place the circle over your eye. Then side-bend neck away from the hand. Repeat the same test on the painful arm. If you cannot obtain the described position without increased pain and/or symptoms, you have tested positive for the ulnar arm tension test. Radial nerve tension test : Test the unaffected arm first. With the arm at your side, take your hand and twist so it is facing palm out. Flip your hand up so the palm is now facing the ceiling. Side bend neck away from the hand. Repeat the same test on the painful arm. If you cannot obtain the described position without increased pain and/or symptoms, you have tested positive for the radial arm tension test. Neck Compression Test : Spurling Test. You should perform this test if you tested positive for any of the three arm tension tests. Once again, you want to begin on your non-painful side to get a good baseline. Extend your head back. With your neck extended, tilt your head to the painful side. Hold this position for 30 seconds. If you feel neck pain, pain or tingling that radiates down the arm, or numbness, then you have tested positive. Perform the same movement on the painful side. If you feel neck pain, pain or tingling that radiates down the arm, or numbness, then you have tested positive. Relief test : For this test, we want to determine if relieving tension on the nerve will reduce your symptoms. Place your painful arm on a pillow for support. Tilt your head AWAY from the painful side. Use your non-painful arm to hold it there up to 30 seconds. Does this position relieve your symptoms? Do you feel less numbness and tingling in the arm? Or you might feel a warming sensation in your arm as it regains sensation. Relief of symptoms indicates a positive test. Start the full Neck Pain Relief Program here.  Includes all videos and printable guide sheets: https://www.bobandbrad.com/health-programs/neck-pain-relief-program Image Provided by AnatomyStuff Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in November 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/Nw4dAqLzm6A Brad: Oh, tight, frozen shoulder. This is going to help you out, whether it's a frozen shoulder, whether it's arthritis, or after surgery or injury. Mike: We're going to show you the best ways to help unlock your shoulder and get it moving normally again. Brad: So this comes in two different parts. In the first part, we're going to show you specific stretches, and in the second part, we're going to show you two specific methods on how to accelerate the stretching, so you can reach your goals of range of motion the way you want it, faster. So, how are we going to get these frozen shoulders or tight shoulders loosened up? Mike: Well, we have numerous options here, and the first thing we're going to talk about is how to stretch them out. Obviously, depending upon where you start is going to limit you with some of these, but just do what you can. Brad: That's right. Should we go to the first one? Mike: Let's go to the first. Brad: Now, we'll do a little therapy lingo. We're talking about flexion. With the shoulder, it means how far you go forward. Brad: Typically, that's one of the first range of motion or the planes that you address as a therapist. So what we're going to do is simply take a stick, a dowel stick, a Booyah Stik . You can use a mop like this, then afterwards, you can clean the floor. So, what you'll do, I'll demonstrate in the standing position, you put the stick on a countertop, a tabletop, anything of that nature. If it's slipping around because you don't have a rubber tip, take your shoe off. Mike: If it doesn't smell. Brad: Yes, and it should be a rubber sole tennis shoe, running shoe works great. Put that in there. Will solve that problem. And Mike's going to do the same thing, but he's doing it with the mop in the seated position. This hand will go up as far as you can. Now it may only go up a little way. What I recommend you do is take a Sharpie or a piece of tape and mark where you start, and you simply lean forward, keeping the arm in the same position, and look at what's going on with my shoulder. What's it doing, Mike? Mike: You're getting a nice stretch. You're actually going into more flexion. Brad: There you go. Mike: In the way, and you're stretching out the shoulder joint, the ligaments, tendons, and rotator cuff muscles, allowing it to possibly move a little more freely. Brad: Right, so you're going to ask, well, how long do I do it? Or how many reps? Five to 10 reps if you're going pressure on, pressure off, that type of cadence. Or if you want to hold it 15, up to 30 seconds, if you can allow that without creating a lot of pain. Now, what you'll do is you're going to, day by day, or it might take longer, sometimes frozen shoulders can really last a long time, this should help accelerate the whole process. You'll bring your hand up, and you'll see where you started, and it makes you feel better when you know you're making progress, just like that. Now, another way you can use the stick is abduction, and that's when you reach out to the side. Mike, do you want to show how that can be done? Mike: You can do this a couple of ways. Are we going to do it seated or standing? Brad: Well, we'll show them both. You can do seated, I'll show standing. I'll jump in when I get my shoe on. Mike: So again, you can do the same concept we just did, but instead of going forward, you're going to go out to the side. So I put it out to my side, and then I lean into it, and you get a nice distraction force. Same concept as forward. If this isn't working for you or seems challenging, you can also just grab a stick, say this is my bad hand, and push it out to the side with the good hand and the stick. Both are fine. Pushing the arm with the stick is more of a motion, pushing it to a higher distance up. Leaning to the side, holding the stick, you're going to get more of a stretch in your shoulder joint. Brad: Now, another nice thing is if you're doing this standing, and you could do the leaning, and/or simply just squat and get the stretch that way. Again, starting out low, going up higher, do the same thing, and get your mark, so you can progress or observe your progression. Mike: Now, the next one we want to talk about is shoulder extension, which means bringing your arm back behind you. Typically, this one is pretty easy for most people, even with a shoulder injury. This is one of the first motions that come back. So what I'm going to do if I'm working my right arm is use the cane or mop handles I have, and push back as far as you comfortably can. Don't bend over to get more height. That's not doing anything for your shoulder. Nice posture. Push back. You can feel a stretch. Hold it five, 10 seconds. Again, you can do five to 10 repetitions of these. Brad: Right, it's just like paddling a canoe. That's what I call it. I use this, I do this one for maintenance on my shoulder three days a week. The other way you can do this is put a stick behind you like this, not to the side, but directly behind you, and then you simply bend your knees, and that's a really nice way to get good extension. Brad: As I mentioned before, you're going to emphasize flexion. So if you spend two or three minutes with flexion, you may only go abduction or extension for half that time or maybe even a third. You'll probably find that abduction may create more pain. If you're getting into sharp pain with these, it's too aggressive. Do not go into sharp pain. Mike, could you repeat that? Mike: Do not go into sharp pain. Brad: There you go. It's important that you don't overdo it and actually tear some tissues. Mike: So the last motion we want to look at is the rotation of the shoulder. So you can go internal and external. Typically, internal with most people is fine or not that hard to get back. External is where we struggle. There are lots of ways you can do this. Now, you can go on a corner of a wall, you can do a door frame itself, or Brad'll show with a stick option. For beginners, just simply put your arm on the corner here and then slowly walk forward. This is going to slowly externally rotate my shoulder. Just bump into the pain a little bit, don't make it worse, and stretch it there. If this feels easy for you, you can certainly progress to having your arm up again on the corner and then walking out like this. Don't rotate in because this isn't doing anything. You want to make sure to rotate and step into it. Again, hold it for some seconds like this. Brad: And if you're using a stick, elbows glued to the ribs. We're not winging out, glued to the ribs, and simply rotate like this, pressure on, pressure off, or hold it 15 to 30 seconds. Brad: Now, if you're interested, and I'm sure you are interested in accelerating the process, we are going to show some tricks that you can do so that the stretching, the range of motion, is going to be gained as fast as possible. Mike: But before that, I'd like to mention you can do it in the doorframe as well. Brad: Oh, sure. In the doorframe, yeah. Mike: Same concept. You just put it here if you don't have a nice corner available in your house. And rotate. You can also lean forward. I'm running into the steps, so I can't lean very far forward, but the same exact ideas. Brad: All right, so we are going to show you two, really, the ways that therapists go about accelerating the progress for the range of motion. Cut. All right, the first little pearl to help your muscles stretch and get that range of motion you need is heat. You need to heat up the tissues, increase the circulation, allow the muscles to relax, and then when you get that, the stretch will become much more effective. So what do we have? The most effective heating pad there is, if you want to get the maximum depth of the heat. What is it, Mike? Brad: So this is a Far Infrared Heating Pad. This is the Thermotex Platinum model . They have many variations and models. But with Far Infrared, it goes a lot deeper into the muscle and through the skin, which you actually want to warm up those rotator cuff muscles in your shoulder. Brad, how far does this penetrate? Brad: Well, if you look at this yardstick, you can see the depth of this blue part. 2.36 inches is what the science has shown the depth of the heat goes to with this. Brad: If you use a regular heating pad, you can, you don't have to purchase one of these, but you will not get near the depth. You'll only get about a quarter of an inch at the most. So this is the best, and that's what we're going to talk about. But again, you can use a standard heating pad. Mike: Now, if you are using this one, we'd recommend that you be in a sitting position. That way, it can stay in place better. It does come with some straps, but just find a comfortable position. You can turn it on, and it only runs very cost-effectively. Pennies a day to operate this thing. Brad: It does, it only has one setting, and that's just the nature of Far Infrared, if it's a true Far Infrared heating pad. And you have to put it on with the panels facing towards the shoulder. This one works best if you sit in a recliner. And if your muscles feel tight in the front, you'll focus on the front. If it's on the back, you'll put it on the back, and you can do it however. Brad: Once you work with it, you understand where it goes. The only difference is that to get that kind of depth of heat, it does take a little more time. You will have that on for a period of 30 to 45 minutes, but you get the depth. So you're going to heat it up for either 30 to 45 minutes with Far Infrared to get into the capsule, which, with a frozen. If we have a regular heating pad, typically 20 minutes is what is recommended. Mike: Obviously, if you have a microwave type one, be cautious that it's not too hot. Make sure to use some towel layers in there. Typical ones, yeah, just plug them in. They typically turn off after 20 minutes. Brad: Right? And so you can leave them on longer. They just won't go near as deep as this. Now, after you've heated the tissues up, you go to these. There's one more step, and that is to go ahead and talk about these a little bit, Mike. I'm going to look at this one. Mike: So, massaging the muscles around your shoulder joint. Now, you can work the muscles directly if they're not too painful or sensitive. You can also work on your pecs or your lat muscles, because they all kind of connect to the shoulder itself. So obviously, if you know someone who's good at giving a massage, they can do a massage on you, but if you're doing it yourself, it's kind of hard to massage your own shoulder, so a massage gun can come in handy. Brad: Right, so make sure you get a massage gun. A lot of people have them; they're very popular, but the travel or the amplitude hopefully is around 6 to 10 millimeters, which is good. Typically, you'll feel a tight muscle if it's in the pec region or in the front. This is our C2 Pro Massage Gun . This one actually comes with a heated head, or you can put it on cool. So in this case, you'd probably put it on heat, and right now it's heating, and you're gonna work in. If you are a stronger, larger person, you'll want a bigger gun like this. You don't have to have it. But if you're a smaller person, a bigger gun's not so good. A gun, more like what Mike has there. Mike: Yeah, the Q2 Massage Gun here is nice, small, easy to hold onto, and massage away with. I actually use one of these at home. It works just fine. I probably wouldn't use a really big massage gun on my shoulder joint specifically, but that's just me. If you are a very muscle-bound or a larger person, then an X6 Massage Gun might work. Brad: That's right. If you do not have a hot/cold head, which a lot of people don't because they are new on the market, it's simply a round head like Mike has, or the airhead is what I would recommend. Most guns do come with that, most of the better guns anyway. And again, heat the muscles up. Work the massage for about three to five minutes in the area that needs it. One big precaution. Do not get into the armpit because you're going to hit your brachial plexus, which is the nerve bundle that feeds all of your arm for sensation and muscle control. If you irritate that nerve bundle, the brachial plexus, it's going to be uncomfortable. It can cause problems. So be cautious of that. Not in the armpit. On the muscles here, up here in the lats. And if you go to the backside, you'll probably have to have someone assist with the gun. Mike: With the shoulder joint, there are a lot of bony areas in there as well, so you probably want to avoid any massage heads that are very pointy, like the bullet head. That's more for a trigger point in a larger muscle group, so. Brad: Right. Yeah, so you know the nice thing about a massage gun, you can use it on a tight, frozen shoulder just as we mentioned, but you can use it on many parts of the body, the calves, like hamstrings, and quadriceps. Where do you use yours mostly, Mike? Mike: I use mine on my legs a lot because that's typically where I'm tight, and I have most of my problems. Brad: I have SI problems, SI joint, and I really find the airhead working that really helps put that back into place. You will use it, and they're just a wonderful thing. I really enjoy using it on my feet just for a massage. Mike: Just don't call me an airhead. Anyway, if you want to check out more videos on shoulder issues, say you do have frozen shoulder specifically, you can watch " 60 Second Frozen Shoulder Exercises & Stretches-Adhesive Capsulitis. " Brad: That's right. Help each other out. Take care and be careful. For this week’s Giveaway, visit :  https://bobandbrad.com/giveaways Bob and Brad’s Products Pain Management: A2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) A2 Pro Massage Gun A7 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy Back Massager C2 Massage Gun (US) C2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy C2 Plus Massage Gun with Heat C2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head C2 Ultra Massage Gun D5 Pro Massage Gun D5 Pro Plus Massage Gun (with heat) D5 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) D6 Pro Massage Gun D6 Plus Massage Gun with Heated Head D6 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head D6 Pro Max+ Massage Gun D6 Ultra Massage Gun EyeOasis 2 Eye Massager EyeOasis 2 Plus Eye Massager with Remote EyeOasis 3 Eye Massager Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling EZBack Go Back, Neck, & Shoulder Massager EZBack Massager   EZBack Massager With Remote EZBack Pro Back Massager EZBack Prime Back Massager Fit Glide Foot Massager G100 Pro Vibration Therapy Massager Hand Massager HandSpa Pro Hand Massager Holy Cowabunga Cream   iMaster Pro Massage Chair iNeck Pro Neck and Shoulder Massager Knee Glide   Lite Foot Massager M7 Plus Mini Massage Gun with Heat Therapy Posture Pad Q2 Mini Massage Gun (US) Q2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head Q2 Plus Mini Massage Gun  Q2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head Q2 Ultra Massage Gun sWAVE Massage Gun with Belt T2 Massage Gun  T2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) T2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head T2 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head TheraHeat Knee Brace TheraPanel 4 -Headed Massage Gun ThermoRed Heated Back Belt Weighted Heating Pad for Back Weighted Heating Pad For Neck and Shoulders Weighted Heating Pad-Long Heating Pad with Weighted Edge X6 Massage Gun with Stainless Steel Head X6 Pro Max Massage with Heat-Cold and Metal Head X6 Ultra Massage Gun Zero Pro Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling Fitness: Hanging Handles​ Pull Up System Resistance Bands​   Wall Anchor​ Stretching: Booyah Stik   Stretch Strap Bob & Brad Amazon Store   and other products Bob and Brad Love Check out our shirts, mugs, bags, and more in our Bob and Brad merchandise shop Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in August 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/UAD4fDySvFA Mike: There's a walking mistake most people make, and they're not even aware of, and it can increase your pain in your ankles, knees, hips, SI joint, and low back. Brad: Now this can actually contribute to one of these problems or all of them, so we're going to discuss what the problem is and how to fix it. Mike: Now, the big mistake most people make when walking is actually landing with a heel strike and a locked-out knee, just like this. Brad: That's right. Now, what this also causes is something we call gluteal amnesia. In other words, the glute maximus muscle does not fire, which changes the mechanics of the hip and can contribute to hip pain. And then the impact of actually the heel strike puts impact forces through the ankle joint, the knee joint, the hip, as well as the back, which can cause pain in one or all of the above. Mike: So what we want to try to do instead is land with a bent knee like this and not with your heel straight out in front of you. Mike: Most people, when they walk, put their foot out in front of them, come over the top, and then maybe go behind a little bit. What we want to do is take a shorter step, landing with a bent knee and then engaging your glute to fire and push back behind you when you are walking. We'll get into a little more detail about how you can do this, especially if you're new to it. So, a good reminder not to lock your knee out when you initially start is to actually place some tape behind your knee. We have K tape here; you can certainly use other tapes as well. Just make sure not to leave it on too long if you have sensitive skin. When you're doing this, you're going to want to keep your leg slightly bent. That way, when I go to straighten my knee out like that, if my old habit kicks in, the tape will remind me and pull on the back of my leg, cueing me to have a bent knee. So Brad will put it on me quickly. Brad: Right. So if you're not sure what K tape is, it's Kinesio tape ; it actually stretches, and it works quite well for this. But you can use pretty much any tape, even if it doesn't stretch. It's really important that the knee is slightly flexed. Flex there about 10 degrees. I like to start at the top, and then we're going to pull it, not really tight, but get the slack out, and with the, if you do kinesio tape, you can stretch it probably about 50%. Get it on there, make sure it's stuck well. If you have hairy legs, well, it'll be more fun when you take them off, and it'll actually remind you that your knee is straight, so it actually works a little better. Go ahead, Mike. Mike: If you're doing this by yourself, I typically would long sit when I first started doing this, and then tape it on the back or the knee. It has a slight bend in it as well. Brad: All right, so then you just simply leave it on and walk all day, which will remind you to keep the weight on the forefoot and avoid an impactful heel strike. Mike: Now, we do want to mention, you want to tape up both knees, not just one side versus the other. And all of this actually came from a physical therapist named Rick Olderman , whom we often work with. If you want to find his work, you can go to RickOlderman.com . Now, the next thing we're going to talk about is how to initially start walking with a soft or bent knee because it often feels odd if you've been walking your whole life with your leg out in front of you and heel striking. So for beginners, what we commonly recommend if you're able to, start on your tippy toes; if you can't, it's okay if you have to be flat on your feet. But when you're walking, try walking your normal way, but place your hands on your buttocks. We suggest doing this in your house so you don't look weird around your neighbors. Brad: It is weird, and it looks weird, so do it in your house, yeah. Mike: So if you're walking with a normal heel strike, we also recommend doing this either barefoot or with slippers on. Because most shoes have elevated heels, which will naturally make you want to heel plant. Brad: But why are we grabbing our buttocks, Mike? Mike: We are grabbing our buttocks to begin because you can see maybe your glutes firing a little bit, but you're not noticing a whole lot. Now, if you try going on your tippy toes and you start walking and landing, you'll notice your glutes are engaging much more, and you should feel the muscles contracting. That's why your hands are on your butt. Brad: Right. If you haven't done that before, it takes a little bit, but you'll get to know when those muscles kick in, and it becomes second nature, and you say, "Oh, I get it now". Mike: Now you don't have to walk on tiptoes the rest of your life, just take 20, 30 steps in your house. Or if you can't get on your tiptoes, you can certainly just land with a flat foot; that is perfectly fine. You just don't want to get your foot way out in front of you with that heel strike. Brad: Right. I think this is really obvious. I know myself, if I'm barefoot and I'm walking on a tile or concrete surface, it's very clear when I heel strike versus forefoot strike, it's probably the best way to teach yourself, in my opinion. Mike: Now, another important component to walking is having strong glute muscles. You have three glute muscles on each side: your glute medius and minimus on the outside of your hip, and you have your glute maximus. We already addressed the glute max with walking; however, we will show an exercise on how to do that after this one. This exercise is going to strengthen your glute medius and minimus. This is important because these muscles keep you upright when you walk. If they did not function properly, you would sway. Mike: That's the extreme version, but it can happen to some people. So we're going to strengthen the glute medius muscles right now. For beginners, you don't need any resistance; you can certainly hold onto a chair, countertop, or stick if you need support. I'm just going to pull up my shorts a little bit here so you can see. I'm standing with a bent knee here. I'm going to kick one leg out to the side and back in. We're going to aim for 10 to 15 repetitions. Notice I'm not swaying over to the side, keeping my pelvis nice and neutral as I do this. I'm not trying to rest my right leg as I'm kicking it out on the ground. So, working on your balance and strength a little bit. Once you do one side, make sure to do the other. You can do this two to three times a day. Again, good posture, slow, controlled movement. No turning your leg out to the side. Brad: Okay, now if you want to have some resistance because going without any is too easy, working some resistance bands like this really helps, where Mike is using a loop band, either one works very well. Simply stand on the band, keeping your feet about a foot apart, and you can change your resistance simply by stretching the band more or changing where you put your feet in the band. You'll figure that out with some practice. And again, good posture, out to the side, toe pointed forward. Brad: With the band, if you turn your toe to the side, the band simply comes off, and you know your mechanics are wrong. If you're losing your balance, simply go up against the wall, and that'll be very helpful. There we go. Anything else, Mike, with the loop band? Was it any different? Mike: Oh yeah, it's harder, it's more resistance. So start with the easy bands, progress to the harder bands. Once you can do 15 reps easily without a band or with the easy band, then progress to the next step. Brad: Right. And again, emphasis on good posture and slow, controlled movement. Mike: Okay, next, we're going to get into glute pumps, how to strengthen your glute max. Brad: Glute pumps. Mike: Now, for glute strengthening, we're going to show two variations, because we realize some people are not comfortable getting on their hands and knees. So I'm going to be on my forearms in this position. I'm going to work my left leg here. We're not going to do a full glute pump all the way up to the ceiling; we're going to go kind of halfway in between, and we're going to do little oscillating movements. Shoot for 30 repetitions total. You need three sets of 10, two sets of 15, and one set of 30. Whatever works for you. If you're not feeling your glute engaging much and maybe your hamstring's kicking in too much or your lower back, try to turn your foot in like this. Mike: This will help isolate the glute max a little bit more. And you can begin like this. Make sure to do this on both legs. If this becomes easy over time, you can take a cuff weight. You're going to put it around your thigh region. Put it on your thigh region like this, and then again, you're going to do the same option, and you should definitely feel more resistance this way. Brad: Now Mike's demonstrating it on this plinth, which would be kind of like a bed. You can do it on your bed, probably best on a carpeted floor or with a mat. Now, if being on your hands and knees like that is not comfortable, you can do this in a standing position, up by a cupboard or a table, something that's solid you can put your hands on or to your forearms. I'm going to use my hands, because this is a little bit lower than a typical cupboard. Bend the knee at 90 degrees. And again, the same motion that Mike talked about, not way up to way down, in that mid-range and working repetitive motions, not too fast. Rotate in like this to get more isolation of that glute maximus. Go 30 seconds or 30 to 40 reps. You can count it. And make sure you do both legs. And there you go. Mike: So make sure to do that exercise as well, two to three times a day, 30 reps total each time. And if you would like to check out more videos on how to improve your walking, or you're still having some discomfort, you can check out the video, " #1 Reason You Should Walk Backwards 1x / day (15 min). " Brad: Now that is interesting. Mike: It is very interesting. You have to watch it, we're not telling you anymore. Brad: No, it is a very excellent video with good ideas. Mike: I wasn't going to tell them anymore. Too late. Brad: Yep, yep, yep, yep. For this week’s Giveaway, visit :  https://bobandbrad.com/giveaways Bob and Brad’s Products Pain Management: A2 Pro Massage Gun A7 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy Back Massager C2 Massage Gun (US) C2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy C2 Plus Massage Gun with Heat C2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head D5 Pro Massage Gun D6 Pro Massage Gun D6 Plus Massage Gun with Heated Head D6 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head EyeOasis 2 Eye Massager EyeOasis 2 Plus Eye Massager with Remote EyeOasis 3 Eye Massager Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling EZBack Massager   EZBack Massager With Remote Fit Glide Foot Massager G100 Pro Vibration Therapy Massager Hand Massager HandSpa Pro Hand Massager Holy Cowabunga Cream   iNeck Pro Neck and Shoulder Massager Knee Glide   Lite Foot Massager M7 Plus Mini Massage Gun with Heat Therapy Posture Pad Q2 Mini Massage Gun (US) Q2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head Q2 Plus Mini Massage Gun  Q2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head sWAVE Massage Gun with Belt T2 Massage Gun  T2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head T2 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head TheraPanel 4 -Headed Massage Gun Weighted Heating Pad for Back Weighted Heating Pad For Neck and Shoulders Weighted Heating Pad-Long X6 Massage Gun with Stainless Steel Head X6 Pro Max Massage with Heat-Cold and Metal Head Zero Pro Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling Fitness: Hanging Handles​ Hand Grip Strengthener Kit   Pull Up System Resistance Bands​   Wall Anchor​ Stretching: Booyah Stik   Stretch Strap Bob & Brad Amazon Store   and other products Bob and Brad Love Check out our shirts, mugs, bags, and more in our Bob and Brad merchandise shop Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in December 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/8b5UMeAURU8 Mike: Today, we're going to dive into 25 common beliefs about the human body and discuss if they're actually fact or fiction. Brad: Yeah, a little trivia here. So let's get right at it. We're going to show the first one. Does gum stay in your stomach, or what happens to it? Mike: For seven years, it's the old saying. I heard that as a kid, you're not supposed to swallow your gum. Now, gum is not digested by the human body. That is very true. However, like most indigestible things we consume, it usually passes within a couple of days. Brad: That's right. Mike: So, although it's not advised to swallow gum, it will get out of your system. Brad: I knew that one from experience. Next. "Do we only use 10% of our brain?" Now this study is a little weird because I'm thinking I only use 10%, but they're saying something different. Mike: So we only use certain parts of our brain with certain activities. However, we use the whole brain throughout the day for different functions. When you're eating and breathing, you're using one function. When you're playing an instrument, when you're walking, you use different parts of your brain for different activities. So you may not be using the whole brain at once, but you do use it throughout the day. Brad: There you go. And they have done brain scans that can literally see activity in the brain. So I guess it must be true. Mike: It must be. Number three. "Does hair grow back thicker after cutting it?" I am a perfect example of this. No, it does not, because mine's pretty much gone. Mike: So when you actually trim a hair, it does not become thicker or coarser afterwards. However, when you have a fine edge where everything's in one area, it looks like it may be thicker, but it actually isn't. The diameter of your hair follicles does not change. Brad: I just kind of wonder about that, because I'm going to measure, you can measure hair, you know, with a micrometer. Mike: Well, you get at it and let me know what you find. Brad: Yeah, I might debunk that one, but that's what they're saying. Alright, let's go to the next one. Mike: Number four, "Does reading and dim light actually damage your eyes?" Now it has said it may temporarily strain your eyes because you don't have as much light, but it's not going to do any long-term damage at all. Brad: Right. Mike: As you will notice, go and look in the mirror, turn the lights on in the bathroom, turn them off, your eyes dilate, and then they constrict more. It's natural, it happens. The body reacts. Brad: Right, so actually now the big concern is blue light and not the looking at a screen before you go to bed for a couple of hours changes your sleep pattern, but your eyes are okay. Mike: Number five, "Is it dangerous to swim after eating?" I remember this when going to the pool as a child. Brad: How many minutes did you have to wait? Mike: They said 30, at least. Brad: That's right. 30, and we looked, you know, "29 minutes. Got one more minute mom!" And here we find out, we could have jumped in right away! Mike: Yes. Brad: So I'm a little concerned. My mother, well, she loved us. Mike: So you'll be fine. What happens when you eat is that your body takes blood to digest the food, so it's not in your extremities. So could you possibly get a leg cramp or something? Brad: Sure. Mike: However, people eat and then exercise right away. Nothing negative normally happens. The other thing that may happen is if you're too aggressive, you may regurgitate your food later if you do too much too soon. But that's a different story. Mie: Well, if it's in a lake, it's no big deal. But if you're in a pool, then everyone has to leave for 24 hours, and they have to shock it, so that is a big deal. Mike: Number six: "Does sitting too close to the TV damage your vision?" I was told this as a child. Were you told this? Brad: Absolutely, "You're too close to the TV, back up. You have to have six feet." Mike: Now, this actually originated in the 1960s, and I guess back then TVs emitted radiation, I did not know that. Brad: The tube TVs, yeah, that was a different story. Now, with the flat screen, everything is different. Mike: So technically, it possibly could have. However, yeah, new TVs, that does not occur. So sit as close as you want. I don't know how much you're gonna be able to see, but your neck might get crunched too. Brad: They do emit blue light. So remember not too much blue light exposure before you go to bed. Mike: I guess it'll just keep you up longer. Number seven. "Does cracking your knuckles cause arthritis?" We did a whole video specifically on this. Brad: And we've cited studies on it, and no, you can crack your knuckles all you want. It's not going to create arthritis in those joints. It's kind of psychologically relieving for a lot of people. Mike: Yes, actually, you have synovial fluid in each joint, with little air bubbles, and that's the popping noise you hear. It's not your bones actually cracking. So, fun fact. Number eight. Do we lose most of our body heat through our head? Brad: Yeah, my dad always said yes. Mike: You know, I felt like this was true as well. However, they find out you lose the same amount of body heat throughout your body. It doesn't actually change; it's just that normally you wear clothes on most of your other body parts, and your head is normally exposed. So it will heat up more because the rest of your body is already covered and doesn't need as much heat. Brad: I always wear a hat, though. Mike: I do. I get cold. Brad: Yeah. Mike: Yeah, but it is trying to release the heat on the head. Brad: You know, the thing that they're not taking into account is when you exhale, it's like blowing a lot of energy out through that breath. So I don't know about that one. They should study it a little bit more. Mike: Apparently, the hypothesis came from a flawed military study. Fun fact. Brad: And yeah, that's where my dad may have got that information from, because he was in the military. Mike: Oh, he's a flawed military study man. Brad: Oh, you're getting close to getting it. Oh, alright, let's go on before I lose it. Mike: Number nine. "Does sugar cause hyperactivity in children?" I don't have children, but my nephews tend to get pretty excited after sugar. Brad: Yeah. Yeah. What they're saying, I think they're saying no, but I'm- Mike: They do not. The perception is that most of the time when kids consume sugary items, it's normally at a party, or an event where there's lots of things going on, they're excited, they're happy. So it's kind of, "Oh, I'm eating something yummy. And also, I am just wound up from playing with friends." Brad: Right. Mike: So you may have that preconceived notion hype. So I will admit it gives you a quick energy spike. But usually, an hour or two later, you do need a nap, and that has to do with insulin. So a little different. Brad: Yeah, well, the kids don't know that. Mike: They don't. They just know they're excited. Number 10. Brad: Can I say one? Mike: Sure! Brad: "Is blood blue in your veins?" Mike: Now, if you've seen any anatomy books, arteries take blood away from the heart. It's typically colored red, and veins are colored blue. Brad: They look blue. Mike: So what happens is when your blood comes from your heart, it is oxygenated, and the more oxygen you have is red. As it comes back, it's less oxygenated or deoxygenated, and it's more of a dark red. It's not actually blue because hemoglobin makes your blood red. Brad: I think everyone knows that one. Mike: Oh, they do!? Brad: Except for the younger people, yeah. Mike: Well, there you go. Fun fact. Brad: "Are fingerprints truly unique?" Now, I know this has to be true because I've watched many, many episodes of "I Spy." Mike: You mean "Law and Order"? Brad: Yeah, "Law and Order", that too. Mike: So fingerprints are definitely individualistic. However, many people have very common traits, and it can be hard to make them different. So although they are unique, they're not necessarily only your own, I guess. Which is interesting, because people go to jail for this stuff. Brad: Right. Well, I think there's a little wiggle room in that one. Mike: We're not in the criminal justice practice, so. Brad: What are we at number 12? We have to get going. Mike: "Can you get warts from touching toads?" I heard this as a child. Brad: No, you can't. Let's just skip that one. Mike: Warts are HPV, a human contracted virus. Those are not warts like in toads. They're actually their cell membrane. Brad: They're ugly. Mike: So fun fact. Sorry, they're bumps and glands. Brad: "Does your heart stop when you sneeze?" Now, this one I've always said yes, it does. Mike: It does not actually stop. It keeps beating; your blood pressure can change due to the influx of pressure. However, it can kind of throw you out of rhythm a little bit, but your heart doesn't actually stop. Brad: Yeah, I know. Now this one, this next one. "Do your nails and hair grow after you're dead?" That's kind of creepy. Mike: It is kind of creepy. However, they do not; your cells need nutrients to actually grow. They need living matter to grow. What happens is your body becomes dehydrated. As you become dehydrated, your skin tends to start retracting. So your nails aren't growing, your skin is actually retracting a bit. Brad: And the same in your hair follicles? Mike: Yeah, I mean, you don't have as much fluid. It gets tighter and wrinkly and then it starts pulling back. Brad: Very good. Mike: So it looks like it's growing, but it's not. Brad: You know, if you did talk to anybody who takes the people after they die and gets them ready to go. Mike: I can't remember what they're called either. The funeral home people. Brad: Yeah. Mike: Anyway, onto the next one. Bob made this list, but we'll read it because I thought this was funny. "Do you need to wait 24 hours to file a missing person report?" You do not. You can file it whenever. I don't know what that has to do with the human body, but it's a person. I guess there's a body involved. Brad: Right. We'll just pretend that we didn't see that one. Let's go to this. This makes more sense. It relates to our previous one. "Does shaving make your hair grow back thicker?" Mike: No. I shave my head too, so no, it does not. But this is what people normally people think of leg hair, or facial hair. Again, it does not make your hair coarser. It's just all one length, and it looks thicker by appearance. Diameter is still the same. Next one. "Does drinking coffee stunt your growth?" I hope not, but maybe that's what caused my shortness. Brad: No, there's no real scientific correlation between that. It's more genetics than anything. Mike: Yes. Next one. Number 18. "Does your tongue have specific taste zones?" I actually have heard this before. Brad: Well, I did too. This is what I learned. I remember coloring it in grade school. The tip of the tongue was sweet or something. Mike: Now, apparently it's not. Your tongue can taste all the different tastes. It's not one specific area that senses sweet, sour, and salty. Brad: Yeah. Mike: The whole tongue works together; it's not really a specific zone. Brad: There you go. Mike: Next one, number 19. "Do you need eight glasses of water a day?" This depends upon you, how active you are, how much you do, and how much food you consume that actually has water in it. Say, like fruits or vegetables tend to have water in them as well. So no, there's no scientific evidence that you actually need eight glasses of water. Brad: And they're not even saying how many ounces per glass. So I think that statement is really vague. You know, eight ounces versus a 16 ounces. I drink out of 16-ounce glasses at my house. Mike: And you probably run to the bathroom more. Anyway, next one. Number 20, "Does eating Turkey make you sleepy?" Now, there is a chemical called tryptophan in Turkey that's more prevalent than in other meats. However, most of the time we eat Turkey at Thanksgiving, we tend to eat too much food, and most people consume a high amount of carbohydrate foods, which again affects insulin, which normally makes you sleepy later. Brad: So it doesn't, Mike: No, not really. Brad: No, that is a fallacy. Mike: 21. "Is the appendix a useless organ?" Fun fact. Brad: Well, I'm pretty sure I know it's not needed because I don't have one, my daughter doesn't have one, my dad doesn't have an appendix. They've all been pulled out of their bodies. Mike: I have mine. Apparently, they are beneficial because they have bacteria, which help feed your gut microbiome. You do not need one to survive, but it can help lead to a healthier gut. Brad: Yeah, well, anyway, as I said, a lot of people don't have them in my family. Mike: Do you want to read the next one? Brad: "Do humans only have five senses?" What kind of a question is this? Mike: Well, we all know the five senses. Taste, touch, hear, well, I forgot the other one. See, Brad: Sight, smell, taste, tactile. Mike: Anyway, yes, we do, but we actually have more. Yeah, we have balance, which is your equilibrium. We have temperature sensation, we have pain sensation, and we also have proprioception, where your body is in space. So we have lots of senses. Brad: Yeah, that was a therapy question. Mike: Do you want to read the next one? Since winter is coming. Brad: Yes. "Does cold weather cause colds?" Mike: This is an old common wife's tale, shall I say? Brad: Yeah, I think a lot of people know you don't get a cold from getting cold. There's more involved in it. Mike: Typically, you contract a virus, it's an illness, it's not a cold temperature thing. So, myth debunked. Number 24. "Is it dangerous to wake a sleepwalker?" Apparently, it is not. It may concern them briefly, or they may be confused, but it's not going to cause them any harm. I mean, if they're walking into traffic, I'm going to go wake them up. Brad: Yeah, if they're walking around the house, I don't know, I've got a friend who's done it, and his wife will not wake him up. Mike: I've never met a sleepwalker. I've met a sleep talker, but it's a little different. Brad: But anyway, supposedly it's okay. But I wouldn't do it too abruptly. Mike: Don't scare them. Number 25, "Are personality traits determined by one side of the brain?" Personality traits? I guess not. No, both sides of your brain work together. Why is this personality traits? Brad: Well, you know, this is for therapy above the neck. We really don't go get involved with it too much. But Bob thought he'd throw it in because a little challenge to the physical therapist, I guess. Mike: No personality traits, does not work from one side. They work together. You do have two sides of the brain, right and left, you actually have more if you want to get nerdy, but they work together with all different activities. And that's 25 facts. Hopefully, that was under 10 minutes. Brad: I don't think it was. Mike: And if you want to check more videos on "Mythbusting", click the video on the screen, " Three Myths That Can Lead to Death ." Scary. Brad: Oh, really? Mike: Yeah, we did that video a while ago. Brad: Oh. Mike: You forgot? Brad: Yeah. That's a dark video, evidently. All right, have a good day. And just a little fun with this. For this week’s Giveaway, visit :  https://bobandbrad.com/giveaways Bob and Brad’s Products Pain Management: A2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) A2 Pro Massage Gun A7 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy Back Massager C2 Massage Gun (US) C2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Therapy C2 Plus Massage Gun with Heat C2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head C2 Ultra Massage Gun D5 Pro Massage Gun D5 Pro Plus Massage Gun (with heat) D5 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) D6 Pro Massage Gun D6 Plus Massage Gun with Heated Head D6 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head D6 Pro Max+ Massage Gun D6 Ultra Massage Gun EyeOasis 2 Eye Massager EyeOasis 2 Plus Eye Massager with Remote EyeOasis 3 Eye Massager Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling EZBack Go Back, Neck, & Shoulder Massager EZBack Massager   EZBack Massager With Remote EZBack Pro Back Massager EZBack Prime Back Massager Fit Glide Foot Massager G100 Pro Vibration Therapy Massager Hand Massager HandSpa Pro Hand Massager Holy Cowabunga Cream   iMaster Pro Massage Chair iNeck Pro Neck and Shoulder Massager Knee Glide   Lite Foot Massager M7 Plus Mini Massage Gun with Heat Therapy Posture Pad Q2 Mini Massage Gun (US) Q2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head Q2 Plus Mini Massage Gun  Q2 Max Massage Gun with Metal Head Q2 Ultra Massage Gun sWAVE Massage Gun with Belt T2 Massage Gun  T2 Ultra Massage Gun (with red light) T2 Pro Massage Gun with Heat and Cold Head T2 Pro Max Massage Gun with Metal Head TheraHeat Knee Brace TheraPanel 4 -Headed Massage Gun ThermoRed Heated Back Belt Weighted Heating Pad for Back Weighted Heating Pad For Neck and Shoulders Weighted Heating Pad-Long Heating Pad with Weighted Edge X6 Massage Gun with Stainless Steel Head X6 Pro Max Massage with Heat-Cold and Metal Head X6 Ultra Massage Gun Zero Pro Eye Massager with Heating and Cooling Fitness: Hanging Handles​ Pull Up System Resistance Bands​   Wall Anchor​ Stretching: Booyah Stik   Stretch Strap Bob & Brad Amazon Store   and other products Bob and Brad Love Check out our shirts, mugs, bags, and more in our Bob and Brad merchandise shop Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

How to Use This Program This free Neck Pain Relief Program is a step-by-step video series designed by physical therapists Bob & Brad to help you reduce, manage, and even eliminate neck pain. It’s a living program, which means we regularly improve, update, and expand it based on what works best for people like you. You don’t have to watch everything Seeing a long list of videos can feel overwhelming—but that’s not how this program is meant to be used. You only need to watch the videos that match your specific symptoms. For example: If your neck hurts most at night, start with “ How to Sleep PAIN-FREE with Neck Pain or a Pinched Nerve .” If your pain shows up when you look down, drive, or sit at a computer, choose videos that focus on those issues. Think of this program like a menu—pick what fits your pain. Go at your own pace You don’t need to finish this program in a day or even a week. Most people get the best results by watching and practicing the videos over several weeks, allowing their body time to respond and heal. Some videos may be worth watching more than once—small details can make a big difference. Your effort matters People who follow the exercises and techniques carefully tend to get much better results. Neck pain often improves fastest when you take an active role in your recovery instead of relying only on outside treatments. Each video includes a downloadable guide sheet that summarizes what you learned, so you can print it, keep it handy, and stay consistent. Start the full Neck Pain Relief Program here.  Includes all videos and printable guide sheets: https://www.bobandbrad.com/health-programs/neck-pain-relief-program Image Provided by AnatomyStuff DISCLAIMER: We insist that you see a physician before starting this video series. Furthermore, this video series is not designed to replace the treatment of a professional: physician, osteopath, physical therapist, orthopedic surgeon, or chiropractor. It may, however, serve as an adjunct. Do not go against the advice of your health care professional. When under the care of a professional, make certain that they approve of all that you try. This information is not intended as a substitute for medical treatment. Any information given about back-related conditions, treatments, and products is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read in this publication. Before starting an exercise program, consult a physician. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.

We approach most neck pain issues with the thought that something in the neck or upper body is not working or moving quite right. This may be due to tightness, weakness, inactivity, and/or poor positioning. The resultant dysfunctional movement or position is causing the pain. An obvious exception would be an injury to the neck from a motor vehicle accident, fall, or some type of sports or physical trauma. Our first goal is to get your neck positioned right, working, and moving right. This is done mainly through specifically designed exercises and proper posture. We hope this will eliminate the root cause of your pain. We want your neck working as well as it can be expected. Our second goal is to eliminate or lessen the neck pain makers in your life. In our world, a pain maker is an action, a position, or a thing that causes pain. Hopefully, this will help you manage your pain while you work on the root cause. Our third goal is to strengthen the posture muscles of the neck and upper back so the neck will remain in the correct position, work correctly, and remain pain-free. We want your neck to be able to handle the stresses of work and everyday living. There are a lot of reasons and causes for neck pain. In the videos that follow, we will try to address the most common ones and hopefully give you the tools to heal. This program may be helpful with: 1. Neck Arthritis 2. Pinched Nerve in the neck (cervical radiculopathy) 3. Cervical Spondylosis 4. Headaches in the back of the head and upper neck. 5. Neck muscle strain or fatigue. 6. Cervical Degenerative Disc Disease 7. Cervical Spinal Stenosis 8. Neck Stiffness. Start the full Neck Pain Relief Program here.  Includes all videos and printable guide sheets: https://www.bobandbrad.com/health-programs/neck-pain-relief-program Image Provided by AnatomyStuff Medical Disclaimer: All information, content, and material on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to serve as a substitute for the consultation, diagnosis, and/or medical treatment of a qualified physician or healthcare provider. Affiliate Disclaimer: Keep in mind that we may receive commissions when you click our links and make purchases. However, this does not impact our reviews and comparisons. We are highly selective in our products and try our best to keep things fair and balanced to help you make the best choice for you.