What are the prevention methods for cervical degenerative diseases?

Cervical degenerative disease can cause serious damage to the cervical spine, and some patients with cervical degenerative disease find it difficult to live independently. There is no effective treatment for cervical degenerative disease, but you can alleviate the progression of the disease and prevent its occurrence by correcting your daily living habits.

Just as there is no effective way to prevent human aging, cervical degeneration cannot be completely avoided. However, you can try to slow down the progression of cervical degeneration by changing bad lifestyle habits. Long-term overload of the cervical spine, inappropriate exercise methods, and incorrect neck posture are important causes of cervical degeneration. To avoid these factors:

1. Avoid bowing your head or working at a desk for long periods of time. Generally, you should stand up and move around for 10 minutes every 40 to 60 minutes to prevent neck muscle strain that may cause failure of the cervical spine's stabilization device and excessive load on the cervical intervertebral disc, affecting its metabolism and accelerating degeneration.

2. When using a computer or watching TV, the screen should be at eye level or slightly higher.

3. When standing or sitting, you should keep your chest up and head up, and do not hunch your head. When lying down, do not place the pillow too high to avoid flexion of the cervical spine; the cervical spine should be kept in a neutral or slightly extended position.

4. Avoid sleeping while sitting in a car or other means of transportation. The cervical spine often shakes involuntarily due to bumps and the lack of effective protection from the neck muscles can easily damage tissues such as the cervical disc, ligaments, and neck and back muscles.

5. Avoid repeated, violent twisting or shaking of the neck. Sudden, violent, and repeated neck movements cannot serve as an exercise, but often cause damage or strain to the neck structure.

6. Exercise your neck muscles regularly in the correct way, such as breaststroke, kite flying, "flying swallow", and isometric contraction exercises of the neck muscles.

7. Warm up before exercise to avoid excessive activity and sports injuries.