At one time or another, everyone suffers from some degree of muscle pain. This is where your muscles are sore and ache. It can be from an injury. People hurt themselves by lifting heavy objects or have work requiring the overuse of certain groups of muscles. Some types of sport quite often involve injury. Equally, the pain can come from stress. Perhaps less obviously, muscles often ache as a symptom of other problems in your body. If you have an infection and a high fever, muscles can be affected. But, most often, there is a strain or damage to tendons or ligaments, or some other injury to the soft tissue of the body. Given this range of causes for pain, there is no fixed set of treatments. It is always for your healthcare professional to fit the best treatment to the injury or disorder you have. That said, the range of potential treatments fall into convenient groups.
We start with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. These are for less serious problems and have two effects: the reduction of pain and of inflammation. Because they are not addictive, they are usually available over-the-counter in a variety of different formats, e,g, as tablets, liquids, topical creams, sprays, and so on. But, if the degree of pain is in the range of moderate to severe, a stronger analgesic is required. Although the injury or damage to the muscles will heal so long as you rest and stay reasonably still, a more powerful painkiller helps to keep you comfortable. However, one word of warning is appropriate.
Just because a painkiller is effective does not mean you can immediate resume mobility. All the drug does is to stop the pain message reaching your brain. It does not heal the injury. You have to wait for nature to take its course. Except, of course, gentle physical therapy and the use of heat and ice packs can speed the process. If the ligament or tendon is torn, surgery may be required. Effective medical intervention to treat the underlying cause of the pain is always required. Because muscle pain can be associated with anxiety, stress-related and depressive disorders, it is often appropriate to prescribe the relevant drugs to control the anxiety, relieve the stress and reduce the depression. You should not feel ashamed that the muscles may be a symptom of a mental disorder. The more important emotion is confidence the treatment will be effective to relieve the pain.
Finally, we come the the different classes of drugs used to control seizures and convulsions, and to relax muscles. Ignoring the muscle pain that can follow a seizure, we are now in the world of barbiturates, benzodiazepines, and so on which act on the central nervous system. Because they depress the nervous system, they inevitably relax muscles but, because of their side effects, it is not always wise to take them unless the threat of seizures is great. Drugs like skelaxin are not used in the treatment of seizures as such although their sedative effect is to relax the major groups of muscles. Skelaxin is used in combination with a combination of rest, physical therapy and other treatments designed to treat the underlying physical muscular disorder. Depending on the precise medical problem, it may be combined with any of the classes of drugs mentioned earlier in the article.
Anti Inflammatory Drugs, Brain, Healthcare Professional, High Fever, Inflammation, Lifting Heavy Objects, Ligament, Ligaments, Liquids, Medical Intervention, Muscle Pain, Muscles, Nonsteroidal Anti Inflammatory Drugs, Painkiller, Physical Therapy, Resume, Soft Tissue, Tendon, Tendons, Topical Creams
ArticlesFebruary 20th, 2010
The injuries we pick up when playing sports fall into two main classes. In contact sports, there are serious risks of broken bones, torn tendons or ligaments, or strains. The other less physical sports leave it to the players to damage themselves by repeating the same muscle movements excessively. So tennis, badminton and squash players find repetitive strain injury to their elbows. Runners damage their knees. Focussing on the muscle injuries, strains and tears always have the same pattern. You damage the tissue in the muscles or ligaments, and this produces inflammation. Pain, swelling and loss of function follow.
For a professional athlete, being unable to turn out for the team or to play the next big tournament can have serious financial implications. Doctors who specialize in sports injuries are therefore employed by all the top teams in football, baseball and soccer. The plan is always to get the stars back on the field again as quickly as possible. Except this can be controversial because, sometimes, treatment is accelerated for a particular match rather than for the benefit of the player’s long-term career. Many top players have had their careers cut short by knee injuries when their teams owner’s were too ambitious for success.
The inflammation is actually the first stage in the healing process. It encourages the growth of scar tissue that binds the torn tissue back together again. Doctors interfere in this natural cycle. The problem is simple. The average cycle of inflammation lasts about five days but, sometimes, it can go on too long and this delays the resumption of training. Thus, the first response is rest during the one or two days following injury. Therapies vary. Pick from heat, cold, compression, elevation and, where money is no object, the use of expensive technology like hyperbaric chambers. Drugs can be used to dull the pain, reduce the inflammation and so speed up the healing process. If the player is finding the affected muscles tensing up, skelaxin is the standard response the relax the affected muscles.
It’s important to understand that painkillers, anti-inflammatories and muscle relaxants do not treat the injury itself. Their only effect is to make you more comfortable during the initial phase of the healing process. Assuming surgery is not indicated for a more serious injury, say to the knee, your body will (slowly) heal itself. Except, of course, where money, status or pride is involved, people will spend the money and invest the time to improve on the natural process. Although everyone should always wait before resuming training, the passion and commitment that makes good players into the best also drives them to take shortcuts.
So, with the help of skelaxin during the resting phase, the player can slowly move on to stretching exercises and, initially, gentle exercise to regain mobility in the affected area. It’s best if no painkillers are used. Pain is a very useful warning you are trying too hard. There’s a serious risk you will aggravate the injury if you resume full training too early. Unless there’s a particular reason why you have to play, you should only move through the training regime at a safe pace. The risk of long-term damage and even longer layoffs is waiting to overtake you. In all this, you should be guided by your doctor and physical therapist. Assuming they are offering independent advice, they should guide you back to a long and successful playing career (whether as a professional or an amateur).
Broken Bones, Contact Sports, Financial Implications, First Response, Football Baseball, Healing Process, Hyperbaric Chambers, Inflammation Pain, Knee Injuries, Ligaments, Muscle Injuries, Muscle Movements, Physical Sports, Playing Sports, Professional Athlete, Repetitive Strain Injury, Scar Tissue, Sports Injuries, Squash Players, Term Career