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Ice or heat? Some doctors tell you to apply ice to an injury for the first 24-48 hours, then switch to heat. Sometimes that works, but sometimes it doesn’t. Ice is useful whenever there is significant ongoing swelling. For many patients, daily activities (using a keyboard or mouse, for instance) continue to create inflammation indefinitely. Then it can be helpful to continue using ice for a longer period of time than just the first 24-48 hours.
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Steroid shots? Steroid injections are often recommended by doctors. Sometimes these shots are necessary, but using steroids means that your tissues, once they finally heal, won’t be as strong.
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Anti-inflammatory medication? At times, these are useful to the healing process. But they can be damaging to the stomach lining. Experiments in animals also show that anti-inflammatories can actually delay healing of damaged tissues.
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Rest vs. activity? Years ago, the typical doctor told you to rest an injured part. Now the pendulum has swung completely the other way: doctors usually suggest keeping the injured part moving. But most doctors are not qualified to differentiate healthy movement from repetitively stressful movement, or from excessively vigorous exercise. Here’s an example: Just allowing the arm to hang passively as you walk around places a mechanical load on the muscles of your rotator cuff. With certain kinds of shoulder problem, even this minor amount of stress is too much.
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Strengthen, stretch, or both? Exercise is essential to the recovery process. But do the wrong exercises at the wrong stage of healing and your recovery will stall. Even stretching, which is often seen as gentle and stress-free, can put an undue stress on an area.
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Treat the part, ignore the whole? Fewer than 10% of people with the symptoms of “carpal tunnel syndrome” have a problem local to the wrist. If you have pain or numbness of the hand, the odds are high that you also have problems of the neck or shoulder region which complicate the situation. Don’t ignore these important factors.
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Treat the injury, ignore the cause? The most common underlying cause for any problem is faulty biomechanics that place an undue load on the problem area. Any treatment program that hopes to achieve a long-term solution must help you sit, stand, lift, swing a tennis racket, or operate a computer mouse with improved ergonomics.
Take Care of Your Pain the Right Way
Improve Performance – In Sports & Daily Life
Ronald Lavine, D.C.
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928 Broadway
Suite 804
New York, NY 10010
212-400-9663
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166 Bunn Drive
Suite 107B
Princeton, NJ 08540
609-497-1944
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