A lot of people come to see me with functional neck and shoulder stiffness and pain. It really is extremely common!

It’s a region of the body with a lot of potential ways to move – there are several joints in the region with large ranges of motion, which is great, but it does mean that when one part becomes slightly injured or irritated and the muscles enter into a holding pattern to restrict movement, another set of movements can take over so that the original area becomes forgotten and more or less unused.

I will often work with people initially in a sitting position on a  normal chair using a moving and dynamic form of Tuina to gently, but firmly find out where the holding patterns are and begin to work them out, bringing blood and qi (energy) back to those areas. People often say it’s just what they needed, but didn’t know it! It can almost feel like the area is being “danced” or breathed back to life! It can often be sore when the acupressure points are stimulated, but that soreness generally lasts a few seconds.

Acupuncture needles are then used to further stimulate, disperse stagnation and reinforce the new healthy patterns, during this part of the treatment you may be lying down and relaxing.

If you really hate the idea of needles, we can often do without, and use the Tuina techniques to do all the work.

Feel free to call and discuss your neck, shoulder, arm elbow wrist and finger problems! My treatments can often help with tennis and golfer’s elbow, RSI-like symptoms, tingling, trigger fingers, tight tendons, cricked neck, stiff neck, occipital pain, scapula pain and so on.