A female singer in Thailand has tragically passed away due to complications, including full-body paralysis, after receiving a neck massage.
According to local news outlets, including Bangkok Post, The Nation, and Thai PBS, Chayada Prao Hom, a traditional Thai music singer, died on Monday at a hospital in Udon Thani, a province in northeastern Thailand. She succumbed to a blood infection and brain swelling.
In a Facebook post from early November, Chayada shared that she had visited the same massage parlor in Udon Thani thrice over about a month, starting in early October. Following these visits, she began to experience symptoms of paralysis. The same therapist used a neck-cracking technique during the first two massages.
Chayada’s death was ultimately attributed to blood infections and cerebral edema. Two days after her first massage, she began feeling pain at the base of her skull. Within a week, her limbs began to numb. Two weeks after her second massage, her body became stiff, and the pain intensified, leaving her unable to move in bed.
In her post, Chayada explained, “My mother is a massage therapist, and I’ve been studying Thai massage since I was a child. I love massages so much that I didn’t think anything was wrong. I assumed the full-body pain resulted from receiving another massage.”
After receiving the third massage, Chayada’s condition deteriorated rapidly, with swelling and bruising spreading across her body. She lost sensation in her torso and, two weeks later, found she couldn’t lift her right arm. By the time she shared her story on social media, she had lost mobility in more than half of her body. In mid-November, her condition worsened further, leaving her completely bedridden. She passed away shortly after.
Commenting on the incident, Thai neurologist Thiravat Hemachudha, an advisor at the Faculty of Medicine at Ramathibodi Hospital, warned that forceful neck twisting or cracking during stretching, exercise, or massage can damage the carotid or vertebral arteries, which can lead to paralysis.
Thiravat emphasized, “The risk increases depending on the amount of force applied when twisting, cracking, or rotating the head.” He added that such activities if repeated over time, can cause problems with the nerves and the blood vessels in the neck.
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