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So Many Choices
Brand fit, Lumia Wellness, NetCloud. I have 3 different neck pillows, neck traction devices that you can use at home that you can buy from Amazon that potentially can help you with your neck pain. which one is actually right for you? Which one is going to make a difference? Which one can you use that’s not going to create a problem down the road?
That is a complicated question. And we’re going to try to jump into it right now. I’m Dr. Emile Tompkins at Tompkins Family Chiropractic. We’ve been serving families for about 20 years here in Southern Arizona. And I see people all the time that come in with some kind of neck discomfort. And I get asked all the time does this neck pillow work?
I get asked LOTS of Questions?
Does this neck pillow work? Does this thing I found on Amazon work? So we’re going to talk about this. Because the answer is going to be yes and no for all of these. But for very different reasons.
Brandfit Cervical Traction
Let’s get into that. The first thing we’re going to talk about is from BrandFit. This is a a traction device.What it’s going to do is you’ve got these little pillows that inflate and deflate. You can release the valve and take air out. You can squeeze this valve and fill it up with air. And as you fill it up with air, and it starts to grow and expand, It’s actually going to create more space in between the verbra of your neck.
It’s really nice because that helps to relieve pressure, which we love and absolutely want. There is an issue or a problem that we can sometimes run into these as you’re relieving pressure. The thing that we can notice is you’re supposed to have this nice normal curvature in the neck and if you lose that curvature, it’s going to create other problems in your neck down the road.
And so this is something that’s very nice if we have brand new pain or severe pain that we want to try to relieve right away. But it’s not ever something that you would use for a very long time because that pulling of the neck over time will remove the curvature in the neck. So we want to be really careful with that.
This is really good though because it provides distraction and can sometimes provide immediate relief for acute pain. neck pain.
Neck Cloud
Now we have this guy here the neck cloud, and this neck cloud from P Health is a very common device that we see. Chiropractors use it. I’ve seen it on Amazon for a while here now.
And it’s really great. You can lie down on this thing and what it’s going to do is help support your neck in its normal curvature. It’s very comfortable. The design isn’t too aggressive, so it’s not forcing a new curvature in the neck. It is just supporting you in your normal curved position.
We like this one a lot. It’s very comfortable to support you in a good position, but it doesn’t necessarily change things. You can usually use it a lot longer than some other types of traction devices. Usually when you start, you only start for a minute or two. You can work your way up to 10 or 15 minutes on this.
It’s very comfortable, but for any of these, you’ll never fall asleep in any of these. Or you’ll create other types of problems. You only use it for a few minutes. Anyway, this works really well. It’s very comfortable. It supports a normal position of the neck. The drawback, if there is a drawback usually is, even though it supports a normal position of your neck, it doesn’t necessarily change the curvature.
It just supports that normal curvature. But it doesn’t create a lot of change. That’s the only drawback. But this is a device that’s good, relatively safe to use.
Lumia Wellness
Now. We’ll go to this one here from Lumia Wellness, this particular neck traction device. This is designed a little bit differently. I’m not sure how well you can see it, but it’s just a little bit different here in that when you use it, it’s aggressively designed so that when you lie on it, it’s going to actually change the curvature in your neck.
It really changes the curvature
The longer you use it, the more change that you’re going to get. Because it actually does change things, you don’t usually use it for very long, two to ten minutes at the most, and you’ll rely on that, and you can do it as often as once a day. And over time, we will see some changes in the curvature of the neck.
Most people have a problem with not having enough curvature in the neck, and when that happens, we’ll develop arthritis and other kinds of degeneration, and we don’t want that degeneration to happen, and this will help prevent that, and this will help reverse any problems with the curvature. Now, that’s a benefit.
PROBLEM: It Really Changes The Curvature
The drawback is, it really does make changes in the spine, and you have to know exactly what your problem is in order to be able to change the right thing. When you position this, you’ll position it either on the lower, in the middle, or the upper part of the neck. That’s cool and all, but if you don’t know what part needs curvature and what part doesn’t, you’re liable to put this in the wrong place and eventually, potentially hurt yourself.
And no one wants that, so you want to be really careful where you put this. So that you make sure that you’re doing things that are safe. We are talking about your spine. Your spine protects your spinal cord and those nerve roots that travel out of the spine. And those nerves go to every single part of the body.
If you put something affecting the positioning of your spine and it’s not in the right position, you can create some problems that can have a major effect on your life. So before you use anything like this, I would definitely advise you to consult your health care provider, your primary care provider.
Your chiropractor, PT, someone like that can advise you on. On what can help you the most and how you would best use it. So we’re going to recap real fast. The brand fit cervical traction device that just gives distraction is really nice. It helps to relieve pain and it helps for acute situations.
You only use it for a few days to a week or two at the most because you don’t want to use this long term and remove curvature from the neck. The Neck Cloud device or things like it, really nice. It is comfortable. It helps support your spine in the normal curved position of your neck. which is really good.
The drawback is it’s not usually enough to change what’s going on inside. Really, the best thing to change is the type of traction that we’ll use in here that provides distraction and curvature which we love. And it works really well. We have this guy here, though, from Lumia Wellness.
This neck pillow is traction device. Will actually, it is positioned in a way it’s designed fairly aggressively to actually make some changes in the curvature of the neck. So long term use over time will potentially help with that. Drawback to this is it really does change things, so you want to make sure you’re using it in the right spot.
So there you go. We have these three devices you can find on Amazon. Which one’s right for you? You probably need to check with your health care provider acute situations. Supporting of your neck curve, actually changing your neck curve in a positive way. There you go. If you have any questions, talk to your doctor.
I’m Dr. Emile Tompkins. Have a great day, and I’ll see you soon.
