How to Choose the Best Pillow to Avoid Neck Pain?

If you want to avoid neck pain, then you must get a pillow that promotes good spine alignment, supports your neck, and facilitates the natural curve of your spine. When you’ve got all these three factors covered, your neck experiences minimum stress.

Neck pain is a serious cause of distress for many. A simple strain can keep you awake all night and unproductive all day.

So let’s look at the best bamboo pillows that can help you avoid neck pain.

Choosing the Right Pillow

Why is the correct loft important?

Appropriate loft of a pillow ensures that the cervical spine is properly aligned with the rest of the spine.

Spinal alignment reduces pressure from the discs, muscles, and joints in your spine. Minimum pressure on these structures protects your spine from:

Strain
Nerve impingement
Disc herniation

Why is correct firmness important?

When your pillow isn’t firm enough, your head sinks into the pillow. So the alignment of the spine isn’t correct despite the pillow being of appropriate height.

So you need to ensure that the firmness is correct to both provide comfort and prevent your head from sinking into the pillow.

Top 4 Pillows to Avoid Neck Pain

Apart from selecting the right firmness and height for the pillow, you need to select the appropriate loft so that you feel comfortable while sleeping.

Here’s a list of the best pillows that can help you to avoid neck pain.

#1 Shredded Memory Foam Pillow

The pillowcase contains shreds or pieces of memory foam. By adjusting the amount of foam present inside the case, you can:

Change the loft of the pillow
Change the firmness of the pillow

These pillows come with all the benefits of memory foam including:

Ability to mold to the shape of your body
Hypoallergenic
Durable

Learn more about Sleepsia’s Shredded Memory Foam Pillow.

Solid Foam Pillow

For a solid foam pillow, you can go with either:

Memory foam
Latex

Both the materials mold to the shape of your body and provide a good level of support. While memory foam is better at relieving pressure, latex is biodegradable and eco-friendly.

So choose one of the fills on the basis of your own liking.

Note: People suffering from night sweats should opt for a memory foam pillow with cooling gel. As foam retains body heat and passes it back while you’re asleep, cooling gel can provide significant relief.

#3 Down and Down alternative

Both down and down alternative come with shredded fill, so you can adjust the amount of fill in the pillowcase and get the desired height and firmness.

If you’re allergic to down, then you can go for a down alternative, which is a more affordable option that feels as plush and soft as down.

While down is extracted from the underbelly of duck or goose, down alternative is synthetically made in labs and manufacturing plants, so if you are vegan or don’t like animal cruelty, then go for down alternative.

Down alternative is also naturally resistant to dust mites and molds because it is a synthetic material.

#4 Hull

Hull is another great pillow material that is quite firm. It’s natural and biodegradable, so you don’t have to look for certifications to make sure it isn’t toxic.

However, it makes a lot of noise, and some people may be allergic to it.

Conclusion

Neck pain can cause serious distress: it can impact your quality of life by hindering your productivity. It can cost a serious amount of money to heal neck pain. The best option against it is to prevent it. Use one of the pillow types mentioned in this post to prevent neck pain and live a long and productive life.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. How do I choose a pillow for neck pain?
Ans. If you want a pillow for neck pain, then go for an orthopedic memory foam pillow which is designed specifically to provide relief from neck pain. These pillows offer better support to your cervical spine so that you can heal faster.

Q. Is memory foam a toxic material?
Ans. Certified memory foam isn’t toxic. Always look for certification from CertiPur-US to ensure that you aren’t buying a foam pillow that contains harmful toxins.

Q. Why do hull pillows make so much noise?
Ans. Buckwheat hulls are used as fill material in these pillows. When you sleep on them, the hulls move around as you do. While moving around, they strike each other and make crushing sounds which can be very annoying. However, many manufacturers have found a workaround and provide noiseless hull pillows.