Jaw Pain and Headaches

As chiropractors, it is common for us to see many patients with headache complaints. These can be tension headaches related to neck and upper back complaints, migraine headaches, hormonal related headaches, etc. Chiropractic manipulation combined with soft tissue care to the neck and upper back can produce significant positive changes to these complaints. Sometimes, the headaches don’t go away. Sometimes the neck and upper back musculature appears to be fine, but the patient complains of headaches at the end of the day after staring at their computer screen all day. When these factors are in play, it is very common for us to see an associated jaw disorder which needs to be treated or the headaches will continue.

Jaw pain is commonly referred to as temporomandibular disorder, or TMD. This just means that there is a problem within the jaw. This doesn’t necessarily mean that there is clicking or grinding, although both of those are common, but there is always a muscular component to the issue. The four most common muscles to be affected are the digastrics underneath the jaw, the masseter which is the main chewing muscle by your cheek, your temporalis which is by your temple, and the medial and lateral pterygoids which are inside of your mouth. Active Release Technique does a great job at treating all of these muscles and releasing them in different ways to allow the jaw to relax and for associated tension headaches to decrease in frequency, duration, and intensity. Sometimes a gloved practitioner will need to go inside of the mouth to release the pterygoids which is not the most comfortable feeling in the world, but the results can be life altering for the better. Dr. Ryan also performs jaw manipulation that can produce significant changes in symptoms and improve jaw clicking immediately.

If your headaches are not going away, or you are having jaw pain that you are “just dealing with,” please do not hesitate to let us know so we can treat it immediately and get you on your way to feeling better as quickly as possible.