Treating Pain

+ Heat/Cold Therapy

Use heat before moving or exercising to loosen your muscles and prepare them for your movement. Use ice/ cold packs after movement or when you feel a sharp pain to reduce inflammation and numb the pain. A couple quick tips:

-It is perfectly normal for your skin to look pinker after applying a hot or cold pack. Before repeating, allow your skin time to return to its normal color to avoid skin damage.

-Ensure you wrap the pack in a towel to avoid using overly extreme temperatures.

-Along with traditional hot or cold packs there are other ways to employ this technique such as taking a warm bath or exercising in a heated swimming pool.

-Heating your clothing up on a radiator can give relief until morning stiffness has eased with movement.

+ Massage Therapy

Massage can be a tool to reduce muscular tension as well as anxiety and stress. The pleasant sensations caused by massage can compete with pain signals, thus overriding the pain signals offering a great deal of relief and helping again to break the pain cycle, therefore giving short- and longer-term relief.You do not need to be see a professional to experience the benefits from massages. If you are able, you can self- treat or ask a friend or family member to help. Ensure they approach the task gentle on the any areas or joints that are particularly sensitive or tender and be vocal if something hurts so as to avoid damage. There are also tools you can purchase to massage your muscles like massage guns.

+ Mindfulness

Some ways to incorporate mindfulness into your day: keep a gratitude journal, do some coloring, practice forgiveness, limit your use of technology, enjoy 15 minutes of sunshine, write down anything that's bothering you. Find more tips here.

These techniques can help you to gain a sense of control over your body through the mind’s ability to affect functions and symptoms within the body.

+ Exercise

Exercise can actually decrease your arthritis pain and is great noninvasive technique for pain management. Use the resources below to learn more.

+ Over-the-counter medications

Acetaminophen relieves minor pain but not inflammation. NSAIDs reduce both pain and inflammation.

+ Topical Gels

These gels work by stimulating sensory nerve endings in the skin, and the body responds by reducing pain signals through the nervous system. Voltaren Gel and capsaicin cream are two options.

+ Trigger Point Injections

This procedure is used to treat painful, tight areas of muscle which contain trigger points or knots that form when the muscle does not relax. A healthcare professional will, using a small needle, administer a local anesthetic, steroids or a combination of the two directly into a trigger point. As a result of the injection the trigger point is inactivated, releasing the muscular spasm and alleviating the pain. A brief course of treatment can often result in sustained relief, at least for the pain caused by that source. These injections are used to treat muscular pain the arms, legs, lower back and neck.

+ Nerve Block

There are several purposes for a nerve block:

1. A therapeutic nerve block is used to treat pain by injecting a local anesthetic to control acute pain.

2. Diagnostic nerve blocks can assist in determining the source of pain, these usually contain an anesthetic with a known duration of relief.

3. A prognostic nerve block is used to determine whether a more permanent solution like surgery is necessary to treat the pain.

4. Preemptive nerve blocks are used in conjunction with surgery to prevent additional acute pain from the procedure itself.

+ Total Joint Replacement Surgery

When other treatment options have failed, your physician may refer you to an orthopedic surgeon to consider joint replacement. Joint replacement involves the removal of part or all of a damaged joint and replacing it with a prosthesis. The prosthesis can be made from plastic, metal such as surgical steel, ceramic or a combination of these materials.

Some factors to consider when deciding on this treatment option: 1. How badly damaged is the existing joint? X-rays are used to determine to what degree the bone and cartilage have deteriorated and if a joint replacement is warranted. 2. Does the resulting pain impact the patient’s daily life and quality of life? If it is thought that joint replacement will improve this it may be considered.

As with any surgery, there are risks, and some risk factors include carrying excess weight or other chronic health conditions.

After the procedure, patients work with a physical therapist to strengthen the muscles around the joint. Some doctors recommend starting physical therapy before the surgery to speed up the healing process. An implant may last from 15-20 years, sometimes longer, depending on the type and level of physical activity taken on by the patient.