Acute neck pain/ injury at the gym

[kierandj]

Hi,

i was bench pressing in the gym yesterday with a flat incline and was on my last repetition for a particular weight when i felt/ heard something tear or pop postero- superiorly in my neck. immediately i felt what i can only describe as a blood rush to my neck and head to the point were i thought my head was going to burst. the only painful part of this was the throbbing and not when i felt/ heard the tear/ pop. has anyone any input on this? the throbbing took about 5mins to go away and then i was fine but when i went to lift anymore weights the throbbing was re- appearing with increasing repetitions????

[Canuck Physio]

Originally Posted by kierandj

Hi,

i was bench pressing in the gym yesterday with a flat incline and was on my last repetition for a particular weight when i felt/ heard something tear or pop postero- superiorly in my neck. immediately i felt what i can only describe as a blood rush to my neck and head to the point were i thought my head was going to burst. the only painful part of this was the throbbing and not when i felt/ heard the tear/ pop. has anyone any input on this? the throbbing took about 5mins to go away and then i was fine but when i went to lift anymore weights the throbbing was re- appearing with increasing repetitions????

Please see a physiotherapist or a doctor to rule our any vestibular artery deficiencies. The neck is something that is too difficult to treat via the web. It is difficult to tell what the problem is and especially for you to attempt any self tests as without knowing what the problem is you could easily faint.

I hope other Physios on here will recommend the same in light of the issue.

[linbin]

hi friend
i totally agree with the above suggestion

[kierandj]

thanks friends,

i had this problem about a year ago and it took about 4 weeks to resolve. i went to the gym to do resistance training a few times over the 4 weeks and i was forced to leave after 5mins or so due to the throbbing in the head/ neck increasing with increasing repetitions... could i have torn any of the structures in the neck that aren't innervated?

[alophysio]

Hi - i am not sure there are any structures in the neck that aren't innervated.

To me it sounds like you have sprained your neck - a 4 week recovery is about right for self-healing but if it is without proper treatment, it is likely to be a less-than-optimal repair and so likely to happen again (as it seems it has again).

THe pain in the neck is likely to be the painful, innervated structure. The head pain is likely to be referred from the neck, particularly the upper neck. If the problem is in the lower neck, the upper neck can be affected by the muscles that cross both regions from the thorax/shoulder below etc.

My recommendation (as with the others above) is go see someone about it. Not likely to be a nasty problem but what if it is??

[Dapy]

The history points to acute on chronic due to repetitive injury to the immature connective tissue.Reason? Wrong muscles to exercise( Deep stabilizers,global stabilizers and global movers), when these 3 types are used wrongly, you are prone to injury.What you can do is to contact your physiotherapist who will assess your motor control and kinetic handling of deep neck muscles and so on.And please stop going to gym for now until you are advised by your PT.