Physiotherapist Oakville: How and when to ice and injury.
Hi Dr. Steve Knighton here from Glen Abbey Physiotherapy here in Oakville. Thank you for joining us again for another healthy living tip from our Live Pain Free series. In today’s health tip we are going to talk about how to use ice for painful injuries. Using ice for immediate injury treatment. We have had patients, doctors and even google differ on icing and heating opinions. We will give you what we think is the best practice. Try for yourself. If your hurt, ice today and get in to our physiotherapy clinic in Oakville tomorrow!
Although simple, a lot of people are doing it wrong. First and foremost most injuries should be iced and not heated. If you do have a question about this contact a medical professional right away. But for a risk reward thing, highly unlikely anything bad happens when you use ice for the injury as long as it’s done properly. But a lot could go wrong with heating an injury.
Physiotherapy: How to ice an injury
We are going to use Stephanie here for this example. Lets say she has a tennis elbow issue. It’s causing here some discomfort and she needs to ice her arm. First thing you want to do is wrap up the ice pack in paper towels or a cloth. A lot of patients come into our office with little burns from directly applying ice packs to the injured skin. So make sure you wrap it up and then apply in this case on the elbow there if that’s where the pain is. Whether you have hurt your back, neck or your nagging tennis elbow has flared up, our Oakville physiotherapy team is here to help.
- Leave the ice pack on for 20 minutes.
- Next take the ice pack off for 20 minutes put it back in the freezer again.
- Then back on for 20 minutes again.
- You can repeat this a couple of times per day as needed.
So to repeat the instructions: First and foremost is wrap the ice pack up then put directly over the area of pain. Leave on for 20 minutes only. Take it off and put it back in the freezer for 20 minutes. Then apply it to the painful area once again for 20 minutes. You can repeat several times a day.
If your pain and swelling does not decrease from this routine make sure you see a medical professional right away. Our Oakville physiotherapy clinic is open 6 days a week. We can directly bill most insurance companies too.
If you or a family member need immediate treatment for pain or injury please call us right away to schedule an appointment 905-827-3593.