Radiculopathy Nerve Pain 7-27-25

Dayna Culwell
Feb 14
4 min read

Ridiculous Radiculopathy

Tingly, numb fingers, throbbing thumb pain, cups fall out of the hand, burning elbow pain

Welcome to Yoga by Dayna! Each week we tackle a new subject. It's usually something that one of you have been suffering from. This week, we will delve into a mysterious set of symptoms that may have nothing to do with the symptoms! Sounds confusing right? It isn't. In fact, it all makes sense but you have to look into the anatomy to make sense of these ruthless sensations. And, just so you'll know, I use analogies to help you picture your amazing internal system. One involves a highway; another involves a water balloon. Let's go!

The glass fell out of my hand

Have you ever picked up something as simple as a glass of water and find it drops from your hand? Have you ever spent some time playing an instrument or sewing and find your fingers start tingling or feel numb? Have you ever had a burning or grabbing sensation in your elbows, even while trying to go to sleep? The problem may not reside in your arms at all.

This week I will introduce to you the concept of cervical radiculopathy. I remember it as cervical ridiculous because the pain or numbing can be ridiculous!

Learn More-Your Cervical Spine

What the heck is going on?

Okay, so we are in Nashville and Franklin this week. “What the heck” is an important saying around here. Let’s delve in. You have 7 vertebrae (bones) in your neck. Each vertebrae has a facét joint in the backside. These often wear out with time. (Yep, it’s the A.G.E. disease). In between each of your vertebrae is a disc. The connection between them is to allow for your nerve pathways to travel outward so that you can feel. Feeling can be lovely or it can be pure hell.

Learn More-Cervical Radiculopathy

The Chin Tuck

A qualified chiropractor or other qualified health professional can manually adjust the cervical spine with the goal of improving mobility and providing a better healing environment.

A physical therapist or Yoga Therapist should prescribe an exercise and stretching routine that is specific to your needs.

Improving your neck and back strength and flexibility may help you to maintain a better posture and help you to become more resistant to pain. Check out the Chin Tuck.

Learn More-Treatment

Better on the Belly

Both yoga and pilates include a set of postures done prone (on the belly). These may include Baby Cobra, Sphinx, Salabasana, and Superpower. These create more musculature in the upper body extensors, which help bring the head back over the spine. Extension of the spine can also be accessed with deep stretching and posture poses. Mountain pose and Extended Mountain pose create space instead of pressure. Your goals are to elongate and strengthen. Beyond that, there are more extreme measures available if these don't work.

Surgical Options

Anterior cervical discectomy and fusion. This surgery goes through a small incision in the front of the neck to remove the disc (which may be herniated or damaged) and then fuses that level of the cervical spine to restore normal height to give spinal nerves enough room and ensure the neck stays stable. This surgery is the most common used to relieve symptoms of cervical radiculopathy.
Artificial disc replacement. Instead of doing a fusion, this surgery replaces the problematic disc with an artificial disc. A potential benefit to this procedure is that it aims to maintain mobility at that level of the cervical spine instead of fusing two vertebrae together.

High Success Rates

Surprisingly, to me anyway, is that neck surgery is associated with high success rates. Neck surgery to reduce hand and arm pain/numbness tends to have a high success rate—some estimates in literature put the success rate between 80% and 90%.

Information on Surgery Options by Dr. Zinovy Meyler, physiatrist with over a decade of experience specializing in the non-surgical care of spine, muscle, and chronic pain conditions. He is the Co-Director of the Interventional Spine Program at the Princeton Spine and Joint Center.

Learn more-Surgical Options