Can hot compress be used during the remission period of chronic pain? How should women apply it?

The vast majority of women in the remission phase of chronic pain can use hot compresses. Only a very small number of women with skin ulcers, those who have just recovered from acute inflammation, or nerve entrapment and leakage need to be postponed. There is no unified standard answer for the application method. Just adjust according to your own pain type. There is no need to impose complicated standard procedures.

A while ago, I helped my best friend who has been sitting for a long time in the office to sort out the winter chronic pain care list. She has suffered from lumbar muscle strain and primary dysmenorrhea for many years. She used to hold a hot water bag filled with boiling water and cover her waist for two hours just after the acute phase. Sometimes her waist would become red when she applied it, and she said the more she applied it, the more it would become sore. Later, I found out that the method was wrong.

There are actually different opinions in the industry now. Some sports rehabilitation experts have suggested that if it is chronic pain caused by nerve entrapment, such as lumbar disc herniation or piriformis syndrome in the remission period, if there is unabsorbed inflammation oozing out at the entrapment site, blind hot compress will accelerate local circulation, aggravate the degree of edema, and in turn compress the nerve and make the pain more obvious. I once read a sharing from a fitness blogger. She had just entered the remission period of piriformis syndrome. She randomly applied a hot compress pack to her lumbosacral area. As a result, the pain was so severe that she couldn't even walk. It took almost a week for her to see a rehabilitation practitioner for adjustments before she recovered. So casual application is not suitable for everyone.

The most common problems that ordinary girls encounter are shoulder and neck pain and low back pain due to muscle strain, as well as cold pain in the lower abdomen and cold legs during menstruation. In fact, hot compresses are not that important. You can find a hot water bottle, warm patch, or coarse salt pack with a temperature between 40 and 45 degrees. Don’t apply it directly to the skin, but put it on another layer. Thin autumn clothes or cotton towels, 15 to 20 minutes each time is enough. My best friend later adjusted the duration of the hot compress and applied it on my waist for 15 minutes every day when I came home from get off work and sat on the sofa. The week before I came to my aunt, I applied it on my lower abdomen for 10 minutes every day before going to bed. After two months in a row, I said that this time I came to my aunt, I didn’t break out in cold sweats like before and couldn’t straighten my waist.

If you have rheumatoid arthritis, or have scars from old injuries in the painful area, lower the temperature a little, 38 to 40 degrees is enough. If you feel tingling or itching when applying it, take it off quickly, don't force it. There are also sisters who have postpartum back pain and pelvic floor pain. If they give birth naturally, hot application during the remission period is no problem. My cousin had low back pain for half a year after giving birth last year. She put a warm patch on the back of her waist every day when breastfeeding, and it gradually relieved a lot. If she had a cesarean section, she had to wait until the wound was fully grown before applying it, so as not to touch the wound and affect her recovery.

Don’t believe the saying that hot compresses need to be applied until they are hot to be effective. My downstairs neighbor’s aunt believed in the sales promotion of the live broadcast room and bought a moxibustion bag that can be heated to 70 degrees to apply on her knees. Within a few days of applying it, she developed a large blister due to low-temperature burns, which caused pain for less than half a month. In fact, to put it bluntly, hot compress is to "loosen" the tense and spasmodic muscles and contracted blood vessels. The temperature is just comfortable and does not burn the skin. If it is too strong, it will burn the good tissues, which is not worth the gain. If you still feel the pain becomes more obvious after applying it two or three times, don't hold on, stop and go to the hospital immediately. Maybe your pain type is not suitable for hot compress at all, so don't delay things by thinking about it.