Looking for a Drug-Free Pain Solution? Look Into Physiotherapy!

Pain can be a helpful messenger, an alert that something in your body needs fixing ‒ but it can also be an agonizing annoyance that ruins your quality of life. To make matters worse, many pain problems are rooted in deep-set underlying conditions, often originating in a different part of the body than the part exhibiting symptoms. Medication may mask your pain temporarily, but it most likely isn’t going to solve a chronic underlying functional problem. Physiotherapy is a very successful pain solution that can help reduce pain without the use of drugs.

The Origins of Pain Problems

The cause of acute pain may be clear enough, especially if it accompanies an auto accident injury, work injury, infection, operation or other event. As the affected part of your body heals, the pain generally fades away. But this is not necessarily the case with some forms of pain. Chronic pain may linger for months or years with no obvious cause in sight.

This pain may be due to:
– Areas of internal scar tissue buildup that restrict neighboring muscles and connective tissues (adhesions)
– Extended disuse after a lengthy recovery period (such as frozen shoulder after many weeks with your arm in a sling)
– Degenerative joint conditions such as osteoarthritis, which produce chronic pain and inflammation
– Muscle weakness, knots or spasms related to poor posture or an unbalanced body
– Chronic pain syndromes such as fibromyalgia, which may affect both nerves and muscles
– Chronic overuse injuries such as tendinitis, plantar fasciitis or carpal tunnel syndrome

Modern medicine tends to turn to drugs early and often in an effort to alleviate pain problems. Unfortunately, this approach may turn out to be nothing more than a stopgap. The drugs may mute the pain for a few hours, but the underlying problem that’s causing the pain remains untreated. As long as that problem persists, there’s a good chance that your long-term pain problems will too. This may force you to use more and more medication ‒ a troubling proposition, especially for addictive personalities or individuals who are already on other medications.

How Can Physiotherapy help?

Once we understand the actual origin point of your pain, we can prescribe a physiotherapy regimen aimed at correcting (or at least reducing) that functional abnormality. Our physiotherapists may start by addressing your immediate discomfort with passive physiotherapy techniques. These natural treatment techniques can include any combination of:
– Deep tissue massage to break an adhesions grip on your internal tissues
– Ultrasound therapy, in which sound waves enhance blood flow and relax tight muscle fibers
– Heat or cold applications to reduce swelling and inflammation
– Electrical muscle stimulation, which uses tiny amounts of current to stimulate your body’s natural painkillers (endorphins)

Once you’re responding to passive physiotherapy, we can introduce active physiotherapy. Our physiotherapists can prescribe exercises that address both localized pain and referred pain problems. For instance, gentle stretching exercises from our physiotherapists can loosen tight, painful muscles and increase mobility in arthritic joints, while core training exercises that correct your balance may relieve chronic strain or neurological symptoms in the body.

Stop Your Pain at the Source!

Our physi0therapists are ready to help you stop your pain at its source, with no need for drugs. Call Craven SPORT services today to schedule your appointment!

Tags: health and wellness, physiotherapy