Cervical spondylosis: A common health issue that worsens with age

Cervical spondylosis can put once life in jeopardy. The discomfort and distress that comes with this health condition is without equal. The agony that follows cervical spondylosisis able keep the victim crying all day and night that known pain killer may not be able to abate.. More than 85 percent of people older than age 60 are affected by cervical spondylosis.
What is this Cervical spondylosis? Cervical spondylosis is a general term for age-related wear and tear affecting the spinal disks in your neck. As the discs dehydrate (i.e lack fluid) and shrink, signs of osteoarthritis develop, including bony projections along the edges of bones (bone spurs).
Cervical spondylosis is debilitating health condition that frequently impacts not only on victim’s sleep but other aspects of victims life. Acute neck pain in most cases will metamorphose to cervical spondylosis for reasons such as these: if the acute neck pain was initially ignored, neglected or improperly treated. Yes you may have been on drugs for your neck pain but to no avail, be informed that you were unwittingly, likely delaying the evil days. Every person suffering this cervical spondylosis must have had acute pain at an earlier time and may have been taking some pain relievers or anti-inflammatory drugs even steriods which may be masking the pain until such a time it may no longer be able to withstand the persistent surge of the pain. This time the spread of the pain has become progressive (i.e the pain may no longer be localized only at the neck but spreads to either of the shoulders, the jaw muscles, the front muscles of the neck, to area above the breasts or may even ascend the scalp from back of the head.
At a workshop held for the Federal Road Safety Corps, (RS 9.5) Egbu, near Owerri, in July 2017, under the auspices of the back pain care foundation, complaints of cervical spondylosis was common. Nevertheless the victims were treated at affiliate clinic of the foundation at #23 MCC road Owerri.
In the recently concluded free intervention treatment exercise carried out by Back Pain Care Foundation in Partnership with Phillips Menarini Company, a pharmaceutical company based in Italy with a sister company in Lagos, exposed the helplessness of victims of cervical spondylosis. They narrated the unsatisfactory relief from prescribed medicines for their agonizing neck pain that is either ascending to scalp or spreading to the shoulders. The free exercise took place at Omega physiotherapy & back pain care clinic, #14 Ndele street, D-line, Portharcourt, in the month of Augus, 2017
When chronic neck pain interferes with your sleep, it is important to find the right way to treat it. Untreated pain can have a serious affect on your sleep, interfering even with everything you do. In addition to limiting your ability to do daily life activities, it can go a long way to interfere with the healing process by impacting the immune system.
A professor in one of the Nation’s citadels of learning in the Eastern part of the country was for years frequently subjected to sleeplessness by disturbing neck pain. According to him the pain started as acute pain when he was only 58yrs and now he is 6 9yrs, the pain has spread to his shoulders and more than that, it often wakes him up, disturbing his sleep
Dr. Oyeyemi, a surgeon and a medical coordinator with one of the Health Maintenance Organization (HMO), has tried all drugs ranging from anti-inflammatory drugs and muscle relaxants to calm down the symptoms of his neck pain. At 49, he battles with sleep and this has affected his weight. “I have had some other health challenges but this one is really taking a toll on me. How can I concentrate on my practice when I cannot have a comfortable sleep and the same time losing weight? I have long ruled out surgery. I know it is a syndrome and I believe that if I happen to get a skilled physiotherapist, the neck problem and its symptoms would vanish. I think it is one of the work hazards as a surgeon”.
“I’am always afraid of the night because a lot of thoughts would be creeping into me caused by lack of sleep. For 4 years, I have suffered this neck pain there is no effort I have not made to get it cured but to no avail. My worries stem from sleeplessness to shoulder pain since the neck pain started. In the office, I would be uncomfortable with any position I place my arm. At night the discomfort of the hand would not allow me sleep. If the sleep comes at all, it is usually short-lived. I have been in this quagmire for long time. Several doctors I mate, advised me to live with it. But it is terrible to be denied good quality sleep. When I watch my wife snoring in her sleep beside me, I envy her. I hope someday I would get remedy to this neck pain and sleeplessness”. This was chief Briggs, of the NDDC, Port Harcourt
A high profile retiree of Nigeria Ports Authority had neck pain that spread to the left shoulder and hand. The sleeplessness that the neck pain subjects him to is more worrisome than the former. According him this challenge has taken him to the United States and Germany where he was told that nothing was seen in his x-rays except insignificant degenerative processes which ought not illicit much agony.
Believe it or not, chronic neck pain can seriously interfere with your sleep. Without mincing words, chronic neck pain of mechanical origin, can be a monster and real nuisance to sleep. I once wrote about a retired squadron officer in the Nigerian Air force who narrated how he suffered from chronic neck pain which graduated to cervical spondylosis. Each time he turns his neck to any direction; it will elicit pain which spreads from the shoulder to the fingers. Tingling sensation and numbness characterized the pain he feels. His fingers were as if he wore a cellophane bag. And each time he tells people about the problem they don’t appear to understand his condition. This was what he said; “Our doctor then in the force would say take these drugs and pain would go”. He said. “I will keep awake for hours in the night despite the pills I take for sleep. Honestly, I sparingly sleep in the night. I found my job uninteresting because I could not perform at maximum; you know this was the military. My wife is so disturbed by this my condition and I did not know where else to go for cure since our doctors at the base are at loss as to what to do to remedy my situation”. To cut the story short, the squadron officer was one of the beneficiaries of the free intervention programme we had early last year at Omega physiotherapy & back pain care clinic, #14 Ndele street,D-line Port Harcourt, Rivers State.