Online Help - February 2009
Home remedies for aches and pain
IMPORTANT! PLEASE NOTE:
Ice packs and heat packs MUST be covered before applying to the skin to avoid burning.
Do not apply ice to the neck. Keep it warm and mobile.
Do not apply heat to bruised or newly scarred skin.
If you are using medication to thin your blood or have a heart condition or raised blood pressure, use a cold flannel instead of ice and hand-hot (not boiling) water for heat; and check with your GP, pharmacist or NHS Direct before using over-the-counter remedies for the first time.
In these straitened times, there is a lot you can do to avoid aches and pains or treat them yourself.
There are a few rules of thumb that will get you through most minor injuries:
Use an ice pack in the first 24 hours of an injury, not heat.
After 24 hours, heat can be used on muscles, but joints will still respond better to cold.
Ice acts as an anti-inflammatory and also numbs the area; heat acts as a muscle relaxant.
If you have arthritis in a joint, a combination of cold and hot is best: apply cold for 2 minutes, then hot for 3 minutes. If you have time, repeat this three times, but always finish with 2 minutes of cold. You can buy heat / cold packs for back and shoulder pain, but for a cheap and easy version, keep a small bag of peas in the freezer and use a hot water bottle for heat. Stick-on hot/cold patches are useful if you are travelling.
Painkillers (e.g. paracetamol) and anti inflammatories (e.g. ibuprofen) will help to keep you mobile, but bear in mind that you still need to avoid doing anything that will put the injured area under strain, such as bending and lifting.
You do not need to spend lots on painkillers that claim to be for a specific part of the body or especially fast-acting – the most basic types are fine.
Arnica cream helps to speed up the healing time, and can be used as well as painkillers.
Try and keep moving around (unless you have injured your foot, ankle or knee, in which case you need to rest with the affected limb elevated above hip height, apply compression e.g. a tubigrip and use a cold pack on it.
See the December 2008 help page for purther details.
If you’re in too much pain to keep mobile, 24 hours’ bed rest, plus using hot/cold and painkillers / anti-inflammatories, is fine. After 24 hours, you need to get up and about.
We have several past help pages dealing with self – help for various problems – why not have a look at one of these?
May 2008, Prevention – 10 great sleeping tips
November 2007: Arthritis help sheet – most of the advice on the help sheet also applies to general / occasional joint pain
December 2008 : Osteopathic First Aid
November 2006: Avoiding and treating low back pain
March 2007: Spring Fever
February 2007 : New year, New you!
If you are unsure or confused about any of the advice given, please do contact us as soon as possible.
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