Thursday, December 2, 2010

Do warm and cold compress help relieve low back pain?


The universal treatment that almost all doctors recommend for people with low back pain is warm or cold compress. There are some data to suggest that heat therapy is helpful when the pain is acute and the duration of pain is less than 3 months. However, many doctors continue to recommend these treatments for people who have had back pain for many years. 

Heat treatments comes in many forms –from hot water bottle, heating pads, electrical appliance pads and infrared lamps. The cold treatments come as cold ice pack, gels, cold towels and ice massages. However, the question is, “do warm or cold compress help relieve back pain which is long standing?”

A recent review of major studies on low back pain where both heat and cold treatments were used revealed the following. There was little benefit from both ice and heat treatment if the back pain was of more than 3 months in duration. However, if the back pain was of short duration, heat treatments only provided minimal relief that was of short duration. In some cases, addition of exercise did help reduce the pain and helped improve function. As far as cold treatment were concerned, there is very little data to support their use. Most people did have any benefit from cold treatments

So what should the consumer do?

If you have new onset of back pain, try some heat and start an exercise program. As far as ice packs are concerned, save your money for the pain pills.