Both can provide comfort for a pinched nerve. Cold can be applied with an ice pack, while heat can be administered by taking a hot bath or by using a heating pad. You may have to experiment until you find the treatment best for you, but keep in mind you may need to seek medical treatment.
Nerve Pain
It's best to use cold when the pain is still sharp and move on to heat once that sharpness has subsided.
Once the inflammation calms down, heat can help relax any tense muscles near the pinched nerve. Heat can also stimulate blood flow, which can aid in healing. Try using a heating pad or a warm compress.
Moreover, local hot compresses can promote blood circulation, eliminate local blood and body fluid retention, and reduce congestion and swelling, thereby reducing the pain caused by nerve compression (Petrofsky et al., 2013).
There are medicines that your doctor can prescribe for nerve pain. They include medicines such as gabapentin or pregabalin. It's best to start these as a low dose, and slowly increase the dose only if you need it. Your doctor will help guide your dosing.
People with nerve pain feel it in different ways. For some, it's a stabbing pain in the middle of the night. For others, symptoms can include a chronic prickling, tingling, or burning they feel all day. Uncontrolled nerve pain can be hard to bear.
Neuropathic pain is sometimes worse at night, disrupting sleep. It can be caused by pain receptors firing spontaneously without any known trigger, or by difficulties with signal processing in the spinal cord that may cause severe pain (allodynia) from a light touch that is normally painless.
Unfortunately, chronic nerve pain rarely goes away completely. However, a combination of multidisciplinary treatments, such as physical therapy, regular exercise, medication, and pain management treatment can hopefully provide significant relief.
For some who suffer from peripheral neuropathy, the heat may alleviate neuropathy symptoms. For others, it may do the opposite. Here are four tips to stay safe while making the most of this season.
In fact, leaving a heating pad on bare skin for too long (or on too high of a setting for an extended period of time) can result in minor burns. Heating pads and electric blankets both have heating elements or coils inside that allow them to heat up. Any device that has a cord has the potential to start a fire.
HOME HEAT THERAPY INSTRUCTIONS
Apply to affected area for NO LONGER than 15 minutes. Use a layer of towels between your skin and the heating pad. Remove for at least 1 hour then repeat. 2-3 applications a day is advisable.
Hot temperatures can make pain feel worse, and for people with conditions like multiple sclerosis, heat can trigger Uhthoff's phenomenon, which causes worsening nerve pain.
During recovery, exercise is incredibly important not just to help your muscles regain function, but also to increase blood flow throughout your body. This, in turn, speeds nerve healing. Likewise, inactivity slows progress. You don't want to overdo it, but the more you move your muscles, the better.
You may need to rest the affected area until it's healed. Nerves recover slowly, and maximal recovery may take many months or several years. You'll need regular checkups to make sure your recovery stays on track. If your injury is caused by a medical condition, your doctor will treat the underlying condition.
Create the right sleeping environment
Make sure that your pillows and mattress are comfortable and don't leave you with added pain or stiffness throughout the night or in the morning. Moving bedsheets and blankets so they're not touching your legs and feet can also help with intensified nerve pain.
Trigeminal neuralgia (TN), also known as tic douloureux, is sometimes described as the most excruciating pain known to humanity. The pain typically involves the lower face and jaw, although sometimes it affects the area around the nose and above the eye.
So how long does a pinched nerve cause pain and discomfort? In most cases, symptoms improve and nerve function resumes to normal within 6 to 12 weeks of conservative treatment. Conservative treatment options include physical therapy, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like ibuprofen.
As temperatures drop at night, your peripheral nerves can begin to tingle more, and you'll feel more burning or sharp pains. Your heart rate also slows when you're colder, slowing your blood and increasing painful sensations.
Salonpas Lidocaine Plus Pain Relieving Cream contains the maximum strength of over-the-counter (OTC) lidocaine (4%), as well as benzyl alcohol, which, according to the company, numbs nerves quickly. Additionally, this non-greasy formula offers rapid relief from musculoskeletal and/or nerve pain.
Do not use heat treatments after activity, nor after an acute injury. Just remember, “Warm up, cool down.” – Apply warm heat before an activity and ice after an activity. Do not use heat where swelling is involved—swelling is caused by bleeding in the tissue and heat just causes more blood to come to the area.