WHEN SHOULD YOU ICE AND WHEN SHOULD YOU HEAT?
While many clinics and health care providers, including Britain’s National Health Service, recommend applying ice to the injury for 20 minutes every two to three hours after an injury, scientific studies on the effectiveness of ice have been inconclusive.
Dr Julie Han, a sports medicine physician at NYU Langone Health, said there was no right or wrong answer on whether to use heat or ice, and emphasised that neither would cure an injury.
“It’s not going to fix anything, it’s not going to impede your progress if you choose one over the other,” she said. “They’re essentially techniques that could be helpful in alleviating symptoms.”
Typically, to reduce pain caused by acute injuries, she recommended icing for the first week or two when the injury is swollen or bruised and then switch over to heat therapy to relax and warm up the muscle if there is stiffness. But there is no hard-and-fast rule, she said.
“Choose what feels better for you,” Dr Han said. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medications, like ibuprofen, and physical therapy are the most effective treatments, she added.
Corey Kunzer, a doctor of physical therapy at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said he typically recommended ice at the initial onset of an injury to help with the pain, and that both ice and heat can be helpful. He tends to recommend heat in the morning, when muscles may be stiffer, and ice in the evening.
Ice is the “safest pain medicine available today,” Dr Mirkin said. But it also reduces inflammation, which is needed for healing, he added.
Kunzer said: “You want some of that swelling and inflammation because that is what some of the healing process happens with,” he said. “At the same time, you don’t want too much because it can be painful.”
Source: CNA
