Science / Medicine : ‘Nine-Ball Neck’

As more take up the game of billiards, doctors can expect to see more cases of “nine-ball neck,” a physician predicted last week. In a letter to the Journal of the American Medical Assn., Dr. Richard Dean Smith of the John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, Calif., said the problem had come to his attention with the case of a 56-year-old occasional pool player.

The man complained of sore, tight muscles in his neck and right shoulder and morning stiffness that seemed “to be worse a day or two after playing pocket billiards, especially nine-ball.”

The physician observed the patient in action and collected further data at a professional nine-ball tournament in Reno. These studies revealed that players “roll” their shoulders, turn their heads and crane their necks when they play.

“In the modern stance, the player extends the neck sharply to the point where the chin nearly touches the cue,” Smith wrote.

The doctor successfully treated his patient with conditioning exercises, massage, heat, proper instruction in technique and encouraging “more frequent participation in billiards.”

“ ‘Nine-ball neck’ . . . will probably occur with increasing frequency as more people now participate in billiards than in jogging,” Smith said.