Chronic Headaches
Nearly 45 million people in the United States live with chronic headaches. About seven million report debilitating headaches that last for hours at a time, at least every two days. It is estimated that 157 million workdays are lost due to headaches and two billion dollars are spent on over-the-counter painkillers to treat headache symptoms each year. Yet most headache sufferers are not content to merely treat symptoms; they want to treat the cause of the pain that takes so much quality from their lives. In short, they want a permanent solution to their pain.
At Clear Passage Therapies®, we have been very successful treating chronic and recurring headaches. Many of our patients have been searching for relief for years before they find us. Some have several physicians, but still find themselves in the emergency room often, due to recurring, debilitating headaches. For most patients suffering from chronic headaches, the search for relief ends with good to total resolution at one of our clinics.
Treatment methods vary considerably, and many people do not obtain pain resolution after conservative treatment such as traditional physical therapy or medications. Chiropractic care may help for a while, but unless we address the strong, underlying adhesions that pull the cranial structures out of balance, resolution of chronic headache pain does not occur. Injections such as nerve blocks may address the symptoms, but do little to treat the cause of the headaches. Surgery for headaches is extremely rare, and considered a treatment of last resort.
The primary goal of our manual therapy (Wurn Technique®) is to increase mobility and decrease pain. We are highly skilled in using our hands to palpate tightened areas of the head, neck, and back until the tensions release. This appears to reduce adhesions, decrease pain, and improve mobility. For more detailed information on how treatment works and how it feels, see “treatment philosophy,” “what we believe,” and “what treatment is like.”
How headaches become chronic
While some headaches are caused by medical conditions such as hormonal or endocrine imbalances, we find that most recurring headaches are caused or exacerbated by mechanical factors. These include muscle tension of the facial, cranial, neck, and chewing muscles and restricted cranial bone mobility. Muscles in spasm may impair circulation within the head and neck, due to their pressure on blood vessels, causing pain. Compression of blood vessels at the base of the skull can cause headaches as blood flow is slowed from leaving the enclosed skull. Any of these conditions may be exacerbated by poor or chronic work postures. Adhesions caused by inflammation at the head, neck, or related structures can be a direct cause of headaches, as strong glue-like bonds pull on pain sensitive structures within the head.
Patients with mechanical headache pain often report that theyfeel a place in their head or neck “where the headache starts, or resides.” We generally find this patient feedback to be accurate and important. It helps us examine the mechanical forces that cause or impact chronic headaches, and relieve them with unique hands-on techniques, without surgery or drugs.
Biomechanics of the head and neck
The head is comprised of 28 bones that articulate with each other, much like continental shelves on the earth’s surface. Some bones define the surface of our skull, while others go deep into our head where they articulate with other cranial bones, connective tissue, the brain itself and various glands (pituitary, hypothalamus, etc.). The central nervous system lies within the tree-trunk shaped structure (spinal cord) which connects most of the major nerves of our body to our brain. This entire structure is surrounded by strong connective tissues which act as protector and shock absorber, as our spinal cord joins and infuses with the tissues of the brain. From the brain, the spinal cord and its protective fascial sleeve travels down through the vertebrae to its anchor at the coccyx.
Thus, the head is composed of remarkable and complex pain-sensitive structures, all surrounded and infused with very strong connective tissues called fascia. Our body’s fascia is actually a continuous weave, a very strong three-dimensional ‘sweater’ that runs from the top of our head through our neck, shoulders, back, and down to our feet.
The head rests at the top of the spine within this strong fascial sweater. Restricted tissues below the head may create unusual pressures on the structures of our head and neck, causing or perpetuating headaches. Restrictions anywhere in the fascial sweater that surrounds and infuses our brain (and the other structures of our body) can create a straight-jacket effect, squeezing pain-sensitive structures within our neck and head, causing headaches.
For this reason, we take a full-body approach when evaluating chronic headaches. In doing so, we find that headaches often accompany the stooped, forward head posture common to certain professions, such as dentists, hairdressers, and people who work in front of computers.
In essence, the head must adapt its position inspace according to the position of the much larger structures below it – the spine, back, and pelvis. Thus chronic or recurring headaches are frequently the result of sustained muscle contraction, compensatory postures, and fascial pulls or joint restrictions further down the body. For this reason, cranial imbalances may occur from structural imbalance in the pelvis, sacrum, lumbosacral junction, or base of the skull. We find a major contributory factor to headaches to be mechanical and soft tissue dysfunction of the mid-back, where thick, tight mid-back muscles create a strong pull at the base of the skull and into the head.
Further down the spine, we find that dysfunctions of the sacral joints (in the pelvis) and surrounding musculature and fascia (connective tissue) may also contribute to chronic headaches. Strong connections from the low and mid-back can pull through the neck to the base of the skull, causing or perpetuating headaches. Unless these tissues are freed from their patterns of spasm and myofascial adhesions, the headaches will continue, and eventually worsen.
Strong attachments of the spinal cord to the tailbone (coccyx) can cause a significant pull up the spinal cord to its attachment at the base of the skull. Thus, when a person falls onto her/his tailbone, or has a physical trauma there (auto accident, physical or sexual abuse) the tailbone can be pushed forward. When that happens, the spinal cord is pulled down sharply, often creating a strong pull on its next attachment at the base of the skull, causing chronic headaches.
Clear Passage therapists are experts at balancing and freeing the mechanical forces which cause and perpetuate headaches. As we decrease the restricted tissues within your head, neck, back and pelvis, mobility returns and pain generally decreases significantly. Freed of the glue-like adhesions, most patients find their cycle of recurring headaches to be significantly improved or completely eliminated after therapy. As pain begins to resolve, we work to restore alignment, balance, and mobility to the entire body, so that headaches do not return. For more detailed information on how treatment works and how it feels, see “treatment philosophy” and “what treatment is like.”
