Find Safe and Holistic Pain Relief Methods with Physical Therapy
There are so many tasks you want or need to do today – but they’ll have to wait until you take your pills. Does this sound like a common theme for you? Prescription opioids are powerful medications that can eliminate pain for hours at a time.
Unfortunately, they can also cause serious new problems in your life, from the risk of an overdose to the unfortunately common grip of addiction. If you’ve been depending on opioids or other pain-relieving drugs just to make everyday life tolerable, physical therapy can help you discover a safer, healthier, and less risky alternative to the pain relief you seek.
Fortunately, physical therapy can help you manage your pain without drugs, giving you a chance to break away from your reliance on opioids.
How can physical therapy help me achieve the pain relief I need?
Physical therapy can help you get a handle on your pain so that you don’t need opioids anymore. Of course, you should only discontinue high doses of opioids under professional medical supervision (to prevent a potentially dangerous withdrawal).
In the meantime, however, our physical therapist can work with you on treating the biomechanical problems that caused your pain in the first place.
Here are just a few of the physical therapy modalities that can help you conquer your pain:
- Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) uses electrical energy to block pain signals to nerves.
- Laser therapy can ease pain caused by injuries, arthritis, muscular strain, tendinitis or neuropathy.
- Massage therapy can control painful muscle spasms, help the tissues expel inflammatory substances, and direct more blood and oxygen to an injury.
- Exercises can increase your pain-free range of motion, strengthen the muscles that support your body, and increase blood flow to reduce inflammation.
A physical therapist can also help you discover relief through:
- Weight lifting: As you begin to experience tension relief and decreased swelling in the targeted area, your physical therapist can then guide you through the process of building muscle mass to support a full and healthy recovery.
- Deep stretching: Your physical therapist can guide you through specialized stretching techniques that will target the source of your pain, thereby helping to improve your range of motion and support the development of muscle mass in the area of your pain.
- Hot and cold therapy: The combination of hot and cold therapy can help to reduce swelling and alleviate pain, and when used in combination with other natural strategies can be a great source of relief from chronic pain.
- Targeted massage: Your physical therapist can identify the area that may be causing the pain and utilize massage techniques to reduce tension in that particular area, thereby helping to alleviate pressure in your joints and reduce pain.
Important facts regarding the opioid epidemic
The opioid epidemic is a very real and serious problem across the globe. It’s believed that some 2 million Americans suffer from an opioid use disorder, such as addiction. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an average of 130 people die from opioid overdoses every day here in the U.S. Since 1999, the number of opioid-related deaths has multiplied sixfold.
That’s why opioids are so dangerous. These drugs prevent pain by attaching themselves to opioid receptors in the brain. In high enough doses, they can also cause both drowsiness and an intensely pleasurable high. The high itself is enough to establish a psychological dependence on an opioid – but the trouble doesn’t stop there.
The brain and body become accustomed to the given dose of opioids, thus creating a drug tolerance. As a result, you end up in need of larger and larger doses, not just to achieve the same degree of pain relief, but just to prevent agonizing withdrawal symptoms. Eventually, the dose you need could become a fatal one.
Even if you are not addicted to opioids, your chronic pain may force you to continue taking opioids on a regular basis. Unfortunately, opioid drugs block pain messages temporarily, but they do absolutely nothing to address the underlying health issue that is causing your pain.
The drugs might even be causing you to do more and more damage to your body while you are numbed from the pain, which ultimately can make your pain problem that much worse.
Discover effective pain relief the natural way with physical therapy
Physical therapy is a clear and compelling alternative to the dangers of regular opioid use and potential abuse.
If you’re ready to curb that daily habit of managing your pain with pills, you can begin by getting started on a physical therapy plan for safe, effective, and holistic pain management!
Contact StepUp Physical Therapy today to schedule your initial consultation.
Tags: Physical Therapy, Physical Therapist, Pain Relief, Natural Pain Relief, Pain Medication, Natural Treatment, Opioids, StepUp Physical Therapy, Painkillers
