Anterior neck muscles (modified from Drake RL et al: Gray's
Anatomy for Students ©Elsevier 2010)
Many people experience neck pain during their lifetime,
sometimes as a result of injury such as whiplash.
Although there are many different causes of neck pain, the
muscles on the front of the neck, the anterior cervical
muscles, can play an important role in recovery.
However not much is known about the function of these
muscles, which makes it difficult to know whether treatments
and rehabilitation that target this muscle group are
effective.
Knowing more about these muscles might therefore help some
people suffering from neck pain.
In particular, we need to understand how each of these
anterior neck muscles is 'built' for its particular job.
Are these muscles best suited for slow steady work such as
maintaining posture or are they better for short bursts of
activity? Fortunately, we can apply modern techniques to
specimens from body donors to answer these questions.
Preliminary results are already suggesting that these muscles
may not function in the way that anatomists and
physiotherapists have previously thought.
Results of this study by Dr Jon Cornwall and Prof Mark
Stringer of the Department of Anatomy and Structural Biology
are due to be presented at a meeting of the European
Association of Clinical Anatomists in Italy in June 2011.
The research is being funded by a research grant from the
Dean's Research Advisory Committee from the Otago School of
Medical Sciences.
A name, residential address, and (preferably residential) telephone number is required from readers who comment on ODT Online. These details will not be visible to site visitors.