CA139,
In your view can the correct forward marathon paddling technique cause additional wear and tear on the C-spine?
I have no idea what forward marathon paddling technique but the issue is that no one knows how you truly paddle. I have extensive experience in healthcare working in the front lines for several decades in primary care. Paddling shouldn’t put much wear and tear on your Cspine because even though your head is staying in place but relatively moving to do so against your turning torso it’s not actually against resistance. But it all depends on your posture and paddling technique. In my career I’ve seen people do things in pretty strange ways, not just paddling but excercise in general, that are quite dangerous. Not saying it’s you but no one can tell.
I am no expert on paddling technique as I consider myself “intermediate”. I think the qualifications that can be given make me a weak “class 3” based on capabilities of what I can do. My endurance is more on “class 4” but my other abilities are barely class 3. I don’t have the certifications to teach and critique paddling technique (like the US or British Canoe certifications etc). But I am sure very advanced paddlers are here so at the very least invoke the more expert paddlers out there and post some gopro videos of your paddling. More importantly I would follow up with the doctors and providers who know you, are aware of your detailed history, and maybe seek a lesson from a certified kayaking instructor.
The other recommendation I would make is when you start using the internet for healthcare recommendations other than very broad stuff like “WHAT WAS YOUR EXPERIENCE WITH MEDICATION XYZ or CLINIC ABC” you can fall down a deep rabbit hole that muddies the waters.
People in healthcare in general already don’t know enough as it is and the advice you get can be very textbook, cookie cutter and spotty as it stands. Unqualified people commenting on how your body works opens up a pandora’s box that may reveal a handful of helpful suggestions but also introduces a lot of things that are potentially dangerous or simply wrong, even from intelligent, well meaning people like those on this forum.
You know what they say about opinions, everybody’s got one and while cost is not necessarily directly proportional to quality when the price is zero you get exactly what you pay for.
Didn’t mean to suggest there is no cervical rotation, but that it’s less than the lower back torso rotation. Also, one doesn’t have to rotate the neck much to see forward. Natural eye motion can take care of that. In that photo the paddle looks to be basically horizontal and at or above shoulder height. Was this during a forward stroke?
Hello tomfrh,
Pain at the base of the neck in the c6/c7 area is often not from what you’re doing in your boat but what you are doing out of it. I had severe pain in this area that also radiated down into my shoulders… I suspected paddling form, past neck injuries, sleeping position, weight lifting (heavy barbell squats with the bar behind my neck), but what my personal problem turned out to be was prolonged sitting in a rounded and forward position over my computer screen both at work and at home. In discussing the pain with physicians and PT folks, I came to realize that craning my neck forward all day stresses the neck and spine. A Physical Therapist likened my situation to holding a 13 pound bowling ball (weight of your skull) for hours is a position not sported by your skeleton but rather by very small and weak neck muscles. He also stated that this type of postural pain and injury has become very commonplace. So what to do if this is a possibility: (1) Change any postural activity that makes your head hang down and forward. Sit up tall at work/home and in your boat. (2) Strengthen your weak and stressed neck muscles. An easy exercise is to place clasped hands behind your head at the base of your skull, keeping your skull level, and isometrically press backwards against your hands for resistance. You can get further ideas from online videos,but you need to get side to side mobility and posterior strength back to your neck and this injury has probably not occurred from paddling form.
For me after a few weeks of self rehab I was back padding without issue. I’ve been paddling kayaks & canoes for 40 years… If someone suggests surgery to fuse your vertebrae make sure to get multiple opinions. 'Luck.
JimH,
It is the end point (maximum rotation) of kayak forward stroke. Here is original uncropped photo:
The animated gif I created illustrates the degree of rotation from one side to the other.
dannemeth,
Thanks for your comments, and yes, work posture is another suspected contributing factor. In my case I have no neck pain. It is all arm pain, and is due to a significant herniation of the disc into my C7 canal, which is crushing the nerve.
I have had four surgical opinions, as follows:
- C5/6 and C6/7 plated fusion with hip autograph
- Posterior foraminotomy OR C5/6 and C6/7 fusion with standalone screwed cages and sythetic graft
- C6/7 fusion with cage packed with hip autograft
- C6/7 fusion with standalone bladed cage with synthetic graft.
They all say the degree of degradation and herniation warrants surgery if the symptoms are intolerable. Even the physios are advocating surgery. They know they can’t fix a shot joint.
When I had my problem, it really was shoulder pain, but the initial orthopedist told me it was my neck and that I had to adjust my hunched over posture in the car (a reclined car seat forces you to hold your head forward), at my computer screen, and in my reclining chair in the evening. Starting with those and then adding sideways mobility stretches and the strengthening my posterior neck muscles with isometrics and bands I gradually resolved the pain. I agree with some of the earlier comments but a good orthopedist should offer a PT plan for x amount of weeks as an option before surgery and if pain doesn’t stop then looking to invasive repairs. If pain goes away with strengthening the muscles then surgery for asymptomatic condition might not be in your best interest. But we’re all different pain wise, and you have to make your own call. Plenty of people have joint damage but function just fine while others are impaired. But earlier points that this is unlikely from paddling are probably correct. Most overuse paddling injuries are to shoulder rotator cuffs, wrists, lower back. C6/C7 would be highly unusual unless you paddle with your head down looking at your lap.
Good luck.
I agree that normal kayak paddling, barring some traumatic event, is unlikely to be the cause of cervical degenerative or cervical disc disease. But some activities that many people might consider to be “normal” and “atraumatic” can absolutely cause cervical disease in the long term and sometimes in the short term.
You are absolutely correct that sitting or standing for long periods of time with the head inclined forward can be detrimental. That is what did my neck in but there was no getting around it as I was a surgeon. Cervical disc disease is endemic in surgeons and hairdressers who spend long hours with their heads inclined forward looking at the tops of their clients heads. And that will likely continue to be the case unless and until someone invents a practical way to suspend surgeons and hairdressers horizontally in mid-air while they work.
Another such “normal” activity is sleeping on one’s stomach which can be very bad for the cervical spine. The neurosurgeon who operated on me for an acute cervical disc rupture said that in a very significant number of his patients, the onset of symptoms was when they woke up after sleeping in that position.
But what I think some people may be overlooking in this thread is that the OP has a documented cervical disc rupture and may have some degree of nerve root impingement. So the question is can kayaking aggravate that pathology. To that I would answer “maybe”. Hopefully it will not but if there is any degree of nerve root impingement either intermittently or persistently, it might.
The five cervical nerve roots that emerge from the cervical spinal cord to innervate the arm and shoulder on each side run only a very short distance after leaving they cord before they pass through the neural foramina. Nerves can’t stretch much at all, at least not without severe damage, so the cervical nerve roots are relatively fixed in position by the spinal cord within the cervical spinal canal. And the size of the neural foramen at each level changes with movements of the neck, flexion, extension, lateral flexion, and rotation.
Here is a brief video that demonstrates the change in size and shape of the neural foramina with forward flexion, extension, and lateral flexion of the cervical spine:
The video does not show the effect of rotation on the size of the neural formina (“nerve holes” in the video) but there is also some compromise of them during rotation which occurs at the facet joints of C3-C7.
Actually about 50-60% of the total range of motion in cervical lateral rotation occurs between C1 (the atlas) and C2 (the axis) with about 25% of the total range of cervical rotation occurring at the facet joints of C3 through C6. Very little rotation occurs between the skull and C1 and between C2 and C3. But despite the fact that the mid and lower cervical spine contribute only a minority of the total range of cervical rotation, rotation in the lower cervical spine occurs early in the range of rotation away from neutral. So even if you aren’t rotating your neck very extremely, there is movement between the facet joints occurring there.
Although routine flat water kayaking may not require very extreme degrees of neck rotation or lateral flexion, some types of kayaking may require a great deal more. Whitewater kayakers who might frequently need to do fairly extreme J leans, head dinks and rolls will be laterally flexing their necks to a much greater extent. And playboaters doing flat spins, back surfing, and cartwheels will be using a lot more neck rotation.