Spondylosis is the Leading Common Degenerative Cause of Neck Pains

If you have neck pain, it highly likely that cervical spondylosis is a related condition to your pain.

Spondylosis is a degenerative condition of the spine vertebral joints. It is also commonly known as Cervical Spondylosis or Lumbar Spondylosis when it occurs in the neck and lower back respectively.

This degeneration is a result of wear-and-tear. The bones and cartilage wear down, narrowing the spaces between the vertebrae. This reduction of space between the vertebrae is what causes the pain sensations.

As the space between the vertebrae narrows, it impinges on the nerve root emerging from the spine at the location. Depending on the location of the nerve root, pain may be felt down the arm or legs.

Studying the Dermatome patterns will enable you to reverse-map where the pain is felt back to the impingement location at the spine.

When a structure is unstable such as degenerating vertebral joint, the body does its best to stabilise it but growing bone spurs as supporting anchor points. These growths of bone spurs is known as osteophytes.

Bones spurs themselves however sometime contribute to the pain sensation when they impinge on the nerves.

It is only the nerves are impinged or pressed on do we experience pain or numbness. Wear-and-tear or Spondylosis alone does not cause neck pain.

It is common to find cervical spondylosis or lumbar spondylosis in older adult as they age given the wear-and-tear they experience. However, it is increasingly common to find spondylosis in the younger population in their 20s and 30s.

Therefore it should not be surprising to find some degree of spondylosis in your x-ray or MRI results even in the younger population.

Early wear-and-tear of joints are usually exacerbated by un-even pressures or forces of a joint as a result of poor bio-mechanics (e.g posture), excessive repetitive movement of the joint and excessive loads on the joint.

Learn more about Spondylosis. Stop by Core Concepts\’ site where you can find out all about physiotherapy treatment and what they can do for you.