Don't Buy These Neck Gadgets Before Your Read This

My friend tagged me in a post on The Book of Face asking me what I thought about these gadgets. 🤔 My answer to her was too good not to share with you so here it is.

The devices in questions are:

A self traction device for your neck – A chunky neck brace that looks like what the ambos would put around your neck if they suspect you had a broken neck. The ad claims to realign your spine, fix your forward head/ text neck, and help you become pain free.
A posture reminder device – A palm size, flat disc that you stick on your back or clothes which peeps at you whenever you dare to slouch. It’s supposed to remind you to sit with good posture all day long so you look perfect and don’t get back pain. It even has an app that tells you all the stats you don’t need.

Here’re my answer copied and unedited for your reading pleasure.

Here’s your long answer. 😊 Traction is a traditional treatment intervention physios use. I have not tractioned anyone for 20+ years, that alone should tell you this thing is a waste of money, but it is important to know why so let’s dive in. 🤓

Traction is a treatment option for people with either cervical or lumbar radiculopathy, which is a fancy word for arm pain that comes from your neck or leg pain that comes from your lower back.

Traction came about when we thought the pain comes from nerves being pinched. We now know this is NOT the case, things like sciatica and so-called pinched nerve are actually Inflammatory conditions, hence, getting the inflammation under control is paramount.

What’s true about traction:
👍🏽 It can provide temporary symptom relief for some people, some of the time.
👎🏽 It can aggravate pain for some people, often quite badly.

The poundage (force) we use to traction varies from person to person, e.g. it will take a lot more force to traction a rugby front rower than tiny little me, this is one of the things that is hard to get right, hence the fickleness of it as a treatment intervention.

Also, the way we do traction in the clinic is with the patient lying on their back. It is important to note that whilst the device is tractioning your spine, it is also stretching your blood vessels, important vessels that take blood to your brain.

Some people can become dizzy or even faint from it and this is with them lying down! Let alone doing it upright and against gravity like this device! We keep a close eye on the patient the whole time they are in traction and are constantly monitoring their response.

This is why I am against upright traction because I don’t think it is safe to traction upright at all even in the clinic, let alone a device to DIY.

That device should, I hope, have some built-in safeguard so people can’t go nuts and add too much stretch. Imagine the law suits waiting to happen if it doesn’t? 😬

That video had a lot of ridiculous animations, I can’t be arsed to comment on all of them but I will bust the forward head posture myth – the forward head posture itself is NOT the problem, it is people spending too long in the same posture, be that forward head, round shoulders, pelvic tilts, or whatever the latest “to-blame” posture is. It is people NOT moving, NOT changing positions that is the problem, it is people being too sedentary, NOT exercising and their body getting piss weak that is the problem.

We have had good evidence for a good while showing posture does NOT cause neck or back pain. Things like stress, a lower social economical background, being a teenage male, to name a few, these are actually associated with higher incidences of neck pain so let’s stop demonising your head and start strengthening your muscles so you can support your own noggin aight!

This also means even if this device makes you feel better temporarily, unless you also strengthen your body with a progressive exercise program, your pain will come back and you likely will end up reliant on it which is very good news for the person selling it to you. 💸

I will be honest and tell you that traction does feel nice. I traction myself regularly, not for radiculopathy, just for a little break from weight bearing, and I don’t use a ridiculous brace like this thing. I use gravity and it is free. All I do is chill out in a forward fold and the weight of my head does the job. Now before anyone goes and tries that, keep reading!

⚠️ When you put your head down in a forward fold, blood rushes to your head, it took me months to build up my tolerance and it is NOT SAFE for some people to do this EVER, such as those with uncontrolled blood pressure, eye pressure conditions like glaucoma, so please check with your own health professional BEFORE trying. Remember I’m NOT your personal physiotherapist and this is something you’re reading on the internet, this is NOT medical advice. I’m only sharing this so you know there are free and not-ridiculous options to explore with your own health team.

Oh yes, that posture beeping device! These have been around and now even have bluetooth and an app and all the bells and whistles. Their premise assumes upright posture is best, but as I have said, posture is not the problem, it’s how long you spend unmoving, unchanging that is the problem, this means you can sit with perfect posture all day and still get pain. If you use that beeper to remind you to move, to change your position, to get up and walk, then sure, but you don’t need to buy a device for that, just set a reminder in your phone.

You’re right, everyone wants some “prop” to magically “fix them” rather than putting in the time and effort to move their body. You know the movie Wall-E? They absolutely nailed it and I surely hope we never get like that!!

What do you think? Have you wasted your time and money on a gadget or four? Don’t feel bad, they all promise the world so it’s easy to get caught up in them, especially when you’re desperate for relief. I most certainly have so reach out and tell me all about your purchases, we can laugh at our mis-investment together. 🫶🏽

If you are in Brisbane and want me to teach you how to safely do neck traction and manage your neck pain, you can book a Vocal Physio appointment with me, all the details are here.