A Novel Treatment for Neck Pain in Active-Duty Military Personnel: The Cervigard Neck Collar

Non-battle injuries are the most common cause of service-member attrition and there is a high incidence of neck pain in the medical personnel who take care of injured soldiers. In recent operations (e.g. Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation New Dawn), musculoskeletal complaints were among the most common reason for hospitalization and medical evacuation; medical hardships represented up to one-third of all injuries. Among the broad spectrum of these musculoskeletal injuries, spinal injuries comprised nearly 25%.

Treatments for spinal pain in military personnel are generally drawn from the civilian population. Spinal pain treatment tends to be multimodal, relying upon physical therapy, pharmacological agents, spinal manipulation, and psychotherapy. However, there are drawbacks to some of these treatment modalities. Opioids and other pharmacological agents may not only lead to addiction and accidental overdose, but can elicit cognitive detriments that may lead to adverse consequences; for example, motor vehicle collisions and balance and memory impairments. Physical therapy is well-studied in the civilian population, yet may not generalize to the active-duty military population due to environmental and occupational differences. As well, there does not exist a wide body of evidence to support many of these treatments in active-duty military. The Cervigard Forward Head Posture (FHP) Neck Collar was developed for patients with severe neck pain due to forward head posture. It accomplishes the correction by applying posterior forces to the zygomatic bones and clavicles, and an anterior force to the cervical spine. This three-point pressure system allows the cranium to translate posteriorly over the shoulders without compromising the cervical lordotic curve.

The objective of this study is to evaluate the treatment effect and safety of a the Cervigard FHP Neck Collar for the treatment of neck pain using self-reported pain and function measures, as well as objective radiological measures of cervical lordosis and head posture.