Technical review by Dr Mohamad Sabsabi

Todd Heslin
2018-08-13T17:15:00+10:00

Every now and then, we receive feedback from medical professionals who are just as excited as us about pillows. The feedback from these health care professionals have shaped our product design choices over the years and we would love to share this feedback with our customers.

Dr Mohamad Sabsabi from Sydney Health & Sports Clinic has been generous enough to provide a technical review of our Sampson pillow. Here it goes! (We've added a link to the pillow he mentions)

In my clinical experience, certain common cervical and shoulder dysfunctions require neutral alignment for the cervical spine during sleep. This is key in order to eliminate the rotational forces constantly tugging at the tissue, tendons and discs and sustaining the inflammatory process in the troubled areas.

There are two critical factors to neck support when laying down on your back:

1. The occiput (skull) being supported in a none forward position to the cervical spine, which is commonly observed in forward head carriage posture aka all of us who look down on our phones

2. Preserving the cervical lordosis by minimizing hyperextension at the Atlanto-axial joint (the first 2 neck vertebrae) a common postural fault seen in sufferers of headaches

A persistent problem that usually daunts back sleepers is a habitual kink, a lateral side bending of the neck to one side during sleep. Creativity in design is the way the Sampson pillow solves the problem at hand. With its spaceship-like design, the guys at Briar Rose were able to create something truly novel and effective for back sleepers.

The pillow create a snug tunnel for the cervical lordosis allowing it to remain closely supported on both side and reducing the room to side bend. Unlike a normal contoured pillow, the Sampson ends at a proper height to allow the head to stay supported on top of the neck, creating an effect of lengthening and decompression to the cervical spine.

If you are a committed back sleeper this pillow was created for you. One should keep in mind a however a short adaptation period to the stretching of the delicate tissue and musculature behind your head, the end result is definitely worth it!

You can get in touch with Mohamad and the Sydney Health & Sports Clinic here.