Natural Wealth, Natural Health
March 24, 2017
If you’ve ever sprained your ankle, you know the true definition of pain.
And misery.
That’s my world right now, thanks to wrecking my right ankle on a roller rink.
That was three days ago. Worse, I sprained my right wrist at the same time.
Now it’s all I can do to get to the bathroom.
There’s no way I can drive a car right now.
And my wrist is so sore I can’t even open a jar of pickles.
Thank God for my good friends Tom and Vicki.
They’ve been kind enough to bring me bags of ice and other supplies.
It’s obvious why I need the ice, but now I’m using it in conjunction with heat to (hopefully) speed up the healing process.
I’m following a protocol I learned from my good friend Paul Bacho, who as I’m sure you know by now is a certified athletic trainer and the co-creator of our “Gentle Hands” headache DVD.
(Shameless plug – if you suffer from chronic headaches of any kind, or know someone who does, do yourself a favor and check out our headache web site at Tension Headaches)
Okay, the commercials over…
Here’s an excerpt from a report Paul wrote some time ago about using his ice-heat therapy for sprained ankles and other soft tissue injuries:
HOW TO USE A COMBINATION OF ICE AND HEAT
A combination of alternating ice and heat can also be used on an injury. I’ve had good results using a contrast bath when treating sprained ankles.
What I do in such cases is put the injured ankle in warm water, then into ice water. The idea is to expand and contract the blood vessels and get as much movement into the area as possible.
Here’s the protocol I use for a sprained ankle: I place the ankle in warm water for five minutes and instruct the patient to move the ankle as much as possible during that time.
However, I stress that this movement should not cause any pain. If it does, I tell the patient to back off of the movements until they do not cause pain.
After five minutes in warm water, I place the ankle in ice water for one minute and tell the patient not to move the ankle at all.
Then I place the ankle in warm water for four minutes, instructing the patient again to repeat as much pain-free movement of the ankle as possible.
Afterwards, the ankle is put back into ice water for another minute. Again, I instruct the patient not to move the ankle during this time.
This is followed by three minutes of the same warm-water treatment, followed by the same one-minute ice water treatment, then two minutes of warm water treatment with a one-minute ice water treatment.
The last cycle is one minute of warm water, followed again by one minute in ice water.
These are general guidelines to follow regarding whether to use ice or heat on an injury.
However, as with any injury make sure you have it checked by a qualified medical professional and follow his/her advice, since this advice will be specific to your condition.
Even with these guidelines, if you are at all unsure about what to do, use ice.
You just can’t go wrong with ice.
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That’s the end of Paul’s excerpt and today’s edition of “Natural Wealth, Natural Health”.
It’s time to use Paul’s ice-heat therapy on my ankle.
Cheers,
Doug Fogel