Physio for Headaches
Many headaches start in the neck. If yours is one of them, an assessment can usually confirm it in a single visit, so you stop guessing and start treating the source.
Many headaches start in the neck. If yours is one of them, an assessment can usually confirm it in a single visit, so you stop guessing and start treating the source.
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Sound familiar?
It starts at the base of your skull or in your shoulders and creeps up, usually one side first, sometimes settling in behind an eye. It’s there by mid-afternoon at your desk, it’s worse in weeks when your neck feels like concrete, and some mornings you wake up already wearing it. You’ve done the elimination rounds: water, sleep, screens, coffee. The painkillers work until they don’t. Nobody has ever looked at your neck.
What’s going on
The joints and muscles of your upper neck share nerve pathways with your head, which means a stiff, irritated or overworked neck can produce a headache that’s felt nowhere near it. These are cervicogenic and tension-type headaches, and they’re among the most common kinds there are. The tell-tale signs: it starts at the neck or skull base, favours one side, flares with desk time and stress, and your neck feels stiff or tender along with it.
Here’s what makes neck-driven headaches different from almost everything else you’ve tried to solve: the diagnosis is testable, in the room, in your first assessment. If your headache comes from your neck, your physio can usually reproduce it, and then ease it, by examining the specific joints involved. You feel it happen. No waiting weeks to see if something worked; you’ll usually know the source before you leave the first appointment.
And if it turns out your headaches aren’t coming from your neck, you’ll hear exactly that, in the same visit, with a referral to the right person instead. Either way, one appointment ends the guessing. That’s the deal, and it’s why you can book this without wondering if you’re about to be sold a long program for the wrong problem.
When a headache walks into any corner of this building, it ends up booked with Abi. She completed her Doctor of Physiotherapy at the University of Melbourne and has a particular interest in headaches and jaw pain, including TMJ dysfunction, which travel together more often than people expect: if your headache comes with a clicking jaw or a face that aches by evening, mention it when you book. What you’ll notice first is her patience. She’d rather trace the whole pattern than treat where it hurts and hope.
1. The whole story. Your headache’s habits: where it starts, which side, what sets it off, what your weeks look like. The pattern is the diagnosis’s best friend.
2. The assessment that answers it. The joints, muscles and movement of your neck and upper back, testing whether your headache can be reproduced and eased from the neck, explained in plain English as it happens.
3. Treatment, then a plan. Hands-on treatment for the joints and muscles involved, usually starting the same visit, then a plan for the real fix: the strength, positions and habits that stop your neck rebuilding the same headache every week.
On the Nepean Hwy in Hampton East with parking on site. Your initial physio consultation covers assessment, treatment and a written plan in the same visit. Private health rebates claimed on the spot with HICAPS. No referral needed.
Book online, or call the studio and describe your headache; the front desk will book you with Abi: 03 9086 3740.
Yes, for headaches that involve the neck, which is a large share of them. Cervicogenic headaches are caused by the upper neck, and tension-type headaches commonly involve neck and shoulder muscles. Physiotherapy treats the source rather than the symptom.
Common signs: it starts at the base of the skull or the neck, tends to favour one side, flares with desk work or stress, and comes with neck stiffness or tenderness. In an assessment, a physio can usually reproduce and ease a neck-driven headache, which confirms the source in the first visit.
Migraine is a different condition and physio isn’t its primary treatment, though neck treatment sometimes helps people whose migraines are triggered or worsened by neck problems. If your assessment suggests migraine, you’ll hear that in the same visit, with a referral to the right care.
It depends on how long the pattern has been running. Many people notice a difference within the first few sessions; the lasting change comes from the strength and habit work that follows. Your written plan will map it out honestly after the first assessment.
Yes. Jaw dysfunction (TMJ) and headaches often feed each other, and this combination is a particular interest of Abi’s, our headache-focused physio at Hampton East. Mention both when you book.
An initial consultation covers assessment, treatment and your written plan. Private health rebates are claimed on the spot with HICAPS, no referral needed.
All for One assesses and treats neck-related headaches at Hampton East on the Nepean Hwy, with parking on site, and at our Yarraville and Kensington studios. Book online or call 03 9086 3740.
Book online, or call the studio and describe your headache; the front desk will book you with Abi: 03 9086 3740.
Experts in their field, specialists in holistic health
Prefer to talk? Yarraville (03) 8319 9945 · Hampton East (03) 9086 3740 · Kensington (03) 8319 9946
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