When a neck/spinal injury is suspected, the jaw thrust technique can be used instead. The main aim of the jaw thrust is to bring the chin forwards without moving the neck. This lifts the tongue from the back of the airway and relieves obstruction. It is worth noting that there are a variety of different jaw thrust techniques used across the world.
That's lower level processing. Higher levels of your brain are also activated to make sense of the sensory information. When you initiate a reflex action, like withdrawing your hand from a hot surface, the first part of the response is initiated at the spinal cord. But, as soon as the information reaches your brain, your motor cortex, cerebellum, frontal cortex, parietal cortex, etc, take over, planning and controlling movement.
The thalamus is a structure deep within the brain stem that receives sensory information from the nervous system and passes the information to the cerebral cortex and other parts of the brain.he thalamus is a structure deep within the brain stem that receives sensory information from the nervous system and passes the information to the cerebral cortex and other parts of the brain.