20/06/2024
Why does inflammation happen? Should I ice my injury to reduce the swelling? Should I stop the inflammation from happening? Should I control the swelling in an attempt to get it back to normal?
Getting too many of these questions daily in the clinic. Saddens me that many people actually felt more painful and stiff after icing and some clinics still impart not wrong but outdated knowledge.
So what is inflammation?
Inflammation is our body's response to sickness or injury or something foreign going into our body like bacteria or germs. So swelling is one of the 5 signs of inflammation besides redness, heat, pain and loss of function. A body's normal reaction to control damage and return the body back to a healthy state. So it has to happen, it should happen and it must happen. We must allow time for the recovery process to take place.
So why is it absolutely necessary that inflammation takes place?
Because there's trauma, an unpleasant event just taken place, tear or microtears within and around muscles, ligaments, tendons and whatever is involved. Just like when there's a landslide or earthquake or tsunami, lots need to be done to clear stuff up.. that's a response, so our body's response is inflammation.
And what's our body's response to icing in relations to injury? Does it help slightly?
Ofcourse it does, ice has its role to play in managing and controlling severe pain, serious swelling and inflammation from getting out of hand, so only in selected cases, those severe ones you involve the usage of ice to control severe pain or secondary hypoxic injury among others.
So actually most injuries do not require ice. So what happens when you actually don't need ice but you use anyway?
Imagine a fire just broke out in a building, how will emergency rescue workers reach the site of the fire if all roads leading to that particular building were blocked? Yes that's right, icing a particular area causes blood vessels to constrict and reducing blood flow slows down recovery therefore causing a delay in muscle regeneration.
So don't ice if not necessary, if absolutely necessary, be very sure of how long you need to ice. Never ice more than necessary. So most of the time either rest, stay calm and allow healing to take place which may be few days to a week or 2, or apply heat for minor aches or ailments as heat improves blood supply thus nourishing surrounding structures better.
Thanks. Hope this helps to change our initial reaction to common light to moderate injuries
