Nature Creation ArticlesHealth, Pain, Therapy, Remedies

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As peo­ple get older, chronic neck and back pain becomes extremely com­mon. The back and neck pain not only affects the phys­i­cal health of these indi­vid­u­als but also their social and eco­nomic well-being. Chronic lower back pain and neck pain can dis­rupt work, rou­tine and other daily activ­i­ties. Peo­ple often choose some exer­cises for back pain. To know some exer­cises for lower back pain or chronic neck and back pain, read Exer­cise For Neck And Back Pain.

There are also cer­tain low back pain treat­ment meth­ods that you can under­take in order to han­dle the issues that may arise as a result of chronic neck and back pain. These meth­ods for reliev­ing back pain will not only help relieve the pain but also help you reduce the like­li­hood of recur­rences of this condition.

The major causes of lower back pain are strains or other injuries to the mus­cles and lig­a­ments sur­round­ing the spinal col­umn. Other rea­sons might include sports injuries or a sud­den increase in phys­i­cal activ­ity to which the indi­vid­ual is not accustomed.

Although, there is no defin­i­tive chronic neck and back pain rem­edy , still it is a highly treat­able con­di­tion. The most com­mon ther­apy used to treat back and neck pain is back pain med­ica­tion with pain-killing or anti-inflammatory properties.

Yet, there is a bet­ter solu­tion instead of tak­ing pain med­ica­tion for tem­po­rary pain relief. Nature Cre­ation is made of 9 essen­tial herbs, which can be used as wrap­per for hot or cold pain relief ther­apy. There are many sizes and designs to fit com­fort­ably to your body and ergonom­i­cally sculp­ture to wrap around the pain area. Please visit the com­pany site at http://www.naturecreation.com or call 1–888–250‑2010 to learn

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Back pain sends more patients to doc­tors than any con­di­tion other than the com­mon cold.
It’s the fifth most com­mon rea­son for hos­pi­tal­iza­tions and third most com­mon cause of surgery. And 56% of peo­ple with lower-back aches say symp­toms dis­rupt their daily rou­tines, includ­ing sleep and sex. Talk about a pain in the…back.

There are many pos­si­ble causes of back pain, which means there are also many non-invasive solu­tions, accord­ing to Todd Sinett, a chi­ro­prac­tor and coau­thor of The Truth about Back Pain. “Back pain is rarely one cat­a­strophic event,” he says in the book, “but sev­eral sit­u­a­tions com­bin­ing to cre­ate pain.” And it turns out that some seem­ingly insignif­i­cant every­day habits can take a big toll on your back over time. Here, the top 14 mis­takes that may be caus­ing your aches and how to cor­rect them.

1. You’re Chained to Your Desk
Did you know that sit­ting puts 40% more pres­sure on your spine than stand­ing?
Let’s be hon­est: Main­tain­ing proper pos­ture is prob­a­bly the last thing you’re think­ing about when under a major work dead­line. And on a jam-packed day, reg­u­lar stretch­ing breaks may not seem like a wise way to spend your time. But skip­ping these habits may cause your back to suf­fer. That’s because back mus­cles will weaken if you don’t use them; inac­tive joints lose lubri­ca­tion and age more quickly.

Fix It: Sit­ting at a 135-degree angle can reduce com­pres­sion of the discs in the spine, so lean back slightly every now and then. Do it when you take a phone call or a coworker stops by to chat, Sinett rec­om­mends. Make sure your office chair sup­ports the curve of your spine, he says: Your lower back should be sup­ported, and your head should be straight—not lurch­ing forward—when you look at your com­puter screen. Get up and walk around for a cou­ple of min­utes every half hour—take trips to get water, use the bath­room, or grab papers off the printer.

2. You Have a Long Com­mute
Just like at your desk, hunch­ing over a steer­ing wheel can tighten chest mus­cles and cause your shoul­ders to round.
Slump­ing pos­ture can zap energy and make you look heav­ier, not to men­tion cause back and neck prob­lems. Back pain is the num­ber one com­plaint of the patients of Dar­ran W. Mar­low, DC, direc­tor of the chi­ro­prac­tic divi­sion at the Texas Back Insti­tute, and he advises them to first think about their dri­ving posture.

Fix it: “Be sure you sit at a 90-degree angle, close to the wheel so you don’t have to stretch,” he says. “Extend­ing your leg puts your back in a com­pro­mised posi­tion, but many peo­ple don’t even real­ize they’re doing it.”

3. You’ve Been Ditch­ing the Gym
Get mov­ing to alle­vi­ate aches and pains and fix back pain faster.
New research shows that 40% of peo­ple become less active after back pain strikes—a strat­egy that’s likely to delay heal­ing or even make their con­di­tion worse.

Fix it: In fact, most suf­fer­ers would ben­e­fit from more exercise—particularly fre­quent walks, which ease stiff­ness, says spine sur­geon Raj Rao, MD. For instant relief, he rec­om­mends stretch­ing your ham­strings and hips.

4. You Don’t Do Yoga
By improv­ing cir­cu­la­tion and low­er­ing stress, just about any kind of exer­cise pro­motes back pain recov­ery. But yoga may be best.
Uni­ver­sity of Wash­ing­ton researchers say yoga eases lower-back pain faster than con­ven­tional exer­cises. In a dif­fer­ent study, 101 patients were ran­domly assigned to one of three groups. The first group took weekly yoga classes and prac­ticed at home; the sec­ond group par­tic­i­pated in weekly exer­cise ses­sions devel­oped by a phys­i­cal ther­a­pist, plus prac­ticed at home; and the third group received a self-help back care book. After 3 months, the yoga group had bet­ter back-related func­tion­ing, com­pared with the other two groups. And after 6 months, patients who took yoga reported less back pain and bet­ter back-related func­tion­ing. Because it pro­motes deep breath­ing and relax­ation, as well as stretch­ing and strength, yoga may help with both emo­tional and struc­tural trig­gers of back pain.

Fix it: You can find yoga classes everywhere—at gyms, YMCAs, and local stu­dios. Make sure to tell the instruc­tor about your pain so she can help mod­ify cer­tain moves for you.

5. You’re Addicted to Crunches
Sit-ups and crunches may actu­ally cause more back pain than they pre­vent, accord­ing to Sinett.
We hear all the time how a strong core pro­tects your back, which is true. But crunches don’t work the ab mus­cles that sta­bi­lize your back. In fact, they can con­tribute to pain by caus­ing what Sinett calls core imbal­ance, “a con­di­tion of exces­sive com­pres­sion, which results in the spine curv­ing for­ward in a C-like shape.”

Fix it: You don’t have to ditch crunches entirely, but you should do them slowly and use proper form. Include them as part of a broader core work­out that also strength­ens your trans­verse abdomi­nus. This mus­cle is par­tic­u­larly impor­tant for a strong, steady core that sup­ports your back, and the best way to strengthen it is with (non­crunch!)

6. You’re Not the Health­i­est Eater
Research shows that eat­ing habits that are good for your heart, weight, and blood sugar are also good for your back.
Finnish research found that peo­ple who suf­fered from back pain were more likely to have clogged arter­ies to the spine than healthy con­trol sub­jects. Healthy cir­cu­la­tion brings nutri­ents to the spine and removes waste, says Sinett. If this doesn’t hap­pen, inflam­ma­tion can result, and inflam­ma­tory chem­i­cals in the back can trig­ger nerves to send pain sig­nals to the brain.

Fix it: A back-healthy diet is one that reduces inflam­ma­tion, accord­ing to the The Truth about Back Pain. The book’s plan advises avoid­ing excess caf­feine and processed foods (read ingre­di­ent labels for the fol­low­ing: hydro­genated or par­tially hydro­genated oils, enriched wheat flour, words end­ing in –ose, and addi­tives that end in –ates or –ites), and eat­ing more whole grains, soy, nuts and seeds, pro­tein (chicken, fish, lean meat), veg­eta­bles, and fruit.

7. You Carry Your Entire Life in Your Purse
A stuffed-to-the-gills hand­bag may cause back dam­age that’s com­pa­ra­ble to a sports injury!
When you tote a heavy bag, your shoul­ders become imbal­anced, says Sinett. Your body ele­vates the shoul­der car­ry­ing the bag, which throws your spine off-kilter. Doing this every day can cause back mus­cles to ache over time.

Fix it: First, carry the light­est bag pos­si­ble. (Some of today’s styles—with chains, studs, and other hardware—are heavy even when empty!) The Amer­i­can Chi­ro­prac­tic Asso­ci­a­tion rec­om­mends that your bag—when fully loaded—weighs no more than 10% of your body weight. Alter­nate which shoul­der you carry the bag with from day to day, and con­sider split­ting your stuff between two bags (one for each arm), which will pain-proof your load by dis­trib­ut­ing it more evenly.

8. Your Mat­tress Is from Another Decade
Can’t remem­ber the last time you replaced it? Your back may be in trou­ble.
A good mat­tress lasts 9 to 10 years, accord­ing to the National Sleep Foun­da­tion, but con­sider replac­ing yours every 5 to 7 years if you don’t sleep well or your back throbs. A study at Okla­homa State Uni­ver­sity found that most peo­ple who switched to new bed­ding after 5 years slept sig­nif­i­cantly bet­ter and had less back pain.

Fix it: When you do replace your mat­tress, take a Goldilocks approach: Pick one that’s not too squishy or too hard. Very firm mat­tresses can increase pres­sure on the spine and worsen pain, say Span­ish researchers. A study of 313 peo­ple revealed that those who caught Zzzs on medium-firm mat­tresses were more likely to report pain improve­ment than those on firmer ones. To help ease night­time dis­com­fort even more, tuck a pil­low under your knees if you sleep on your back, between your knees if you’re a side sleeper, or beneath your stom­ach and hips if you snooze on your belly.

9. You Have a Thing for High Heels
Or flip-flops. Both lead to foot insta­bil­ity, which can in turn affect your back.
High heels force you to arch your back, mak­ing your spinal mus­cles work harder. Back­less shoes like san­dals cause your feet to move from side to side, accord­ing to Sinett, which dis­trib­utes your body weight unevenly and can cause pain.

Fix it: You don’t have to forgo trendy footwear—just don’t walk long dis­tances in them. Com­mute in comfy flats or sup­port­ive sneak­ers, and con­sider adding cush­ion­ing inserts to uncomfy shoes. When Lehigh Uni­ver­sity researchers gave back-pain suf­fer­ers light­weight, flex­i­ble shoes with sim­ple cush­ions, 80% reported sig­nif­i­cant relief within a year.

10. You Ignore the Pain
Try­ing to block out pain could make it worse, finds research from the Ros­alind Franklin Uni­ver­sity of Med­i­cine and Sci­ence.
A bet­ter approach: Let your­self con­sciously expe­ri­ence the hurt. In a stan­dard pain test, psy­chol­o­gists had 68 back-pain suf­fer­ers plunge their hands or feet into ice water. When the vol­un­teers were instructed to sup­press the shock of the icy water, a key mus­cle in the back clenched. In con­trast, the mus­cle didn’t tense up when vol­un­teers thought only about the shock. Over time, an increase in mus­cle ten­sion inten­si­fies pain, says lead researcher John W. Burns, PhD.

Fix it: Accept­ing pain may be the best way to men­tally cope. “Try think­ing about the sen­sory details of the expe­ri­ence, not the neg­a­tive emo­tions,” says Burns. “If you have a back spasm, describe the pain to yourself—if it’s burn­ing or throbbing—and remind your­self that it will pass.”

Over­all, if you are look­ing for tem­po­rary nat­ural back pain reliever, there is Nature Cre­ation. Nature Cre­ation is made of 9 essen­tial herbs, which can be used as wrap­per for hot or cold pain relief ther­apy. There are many sizes and designs to fit com­fort­ably to your body and ergonom­i­cally sculp­ture to wrap around the pain area. Please visit the com­pany site at http://www.naturecreation.com or call 1–888-250‑2010 to learn more of this amaz­ing product

Note: Arti­cle was quoted from Pre­ven­tion Magazine

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There is a strong con­nec­tion between stress and back pain. Stress causes a release of stress hor­mones. Stress hor­mones increase the per­cep­tion of pain.

Stress hor­mones also cause the mus­cles to tighten up. The mus­cles may tense up so much they go into painful spasms. Back and neck mus­cles are par­tic­u­larly sen­si­tive to the effects of stress.

Mus­cle ten­sion reduces blood flow to the tis­sues (reduced oxy­gen and nutri­ents to the tis­sues). Reduced blood flow delays heal­ing. Ade­quate cir­cu­la­tion is also nec­es­sary to flush acidic waste prod­ucts (byprod­ucts of mus­cu­lar activ­ity) from the tis­sues. A build up of acidic waste prod­ucts in the tis­sues can cause fatigue and pain.

Stress in itself can cause back pain. A per­son with a ‘bad back’, e.g. a per­son who has scar tis­sue from an old injury or degen­er­a­tive changes in the spine due to aging, may notice the effects of stress trig­ger­ing back pain even more than some­one with a healthy back. The slight­est mus­cle ten­sion may be ‘the straw the broke the camel’s back.’ For instance, if spinal nerves are already restricted by scar tis­sue or cal­cium deposits it may take min­i­mal mus­cle ten­sion to com­press nerves and cause pain. Sci­at­ica may flare up when one is feel­ing stressed.

Tense back mus­cles increase back pain and pain increases tens­ing of mus­cles — a vicious cycle of stress and back pain can be created.

The back is less capa­ble of tol­er­at­ing even mild abuse (lift­ing some­thing slightly heavy, poor pos­ture, a sud­den twist, sit­ting too long, etc) when a per­son is under stress. Stress causes the mus­cles to tighten up, leav­ing them vul­ner­a­ble to injury.
Reduc­ing Stress

Reliev­ing stress can reduce pain that is aggra­vated or caused by tense mus­cles. Man­ag­ing stress on an ongo­ing basis may also help pre­vent back pain from occur­ring in the first place.

Relax­ation Tech­niques
Relax­ation tech­niques invoke the “relax­ation response”, mus­cles relax­ation and blood pres­sure, heart­beat, and res­pi­ra­tion decrease. This is the oppo­site of the “stress response” where mus­cles tense and blood pres­sure, heart­beat, and res­pi­ra­tion increase. Nature Cre­ation is the nat­ural pain and stress relief herbal packs, which may help you to achieve your relax­ation objec­tives while reliev­ing pain nat­u­rally. Each pack is filled with 9 essen­tial nat­ural herbs which you may use it as hot or cold pain treat­ments and/ or relax­ation ther­a­pies. There are more than 18 dif­fer­ent designs which each will com­fort­ably fit onto the con­tour of your body.

Exer­cise
Stress can be relieved through exer­cise. Aer­o­bic exer­cise is a par­tic­u­larly effec­tive form of exer­cise for reliev­ing stress –aer­o­bic exer­cise burns off stress hor­mones and increases the body’s pro­duc­tion of endor­phins — nat­u­rally occur­ring chem­i­cals that relieve pain and improve mood. Stretch­ing exer­cises also can relieve stress and loosen tight mus­cles. Yoga incor­po­rates poses that increase strength and flex­i­bil­ity with breath­ing tech­niques to relieve stress.

There are many relax­ation tech­niques, from sim­ple deep breath­ing exer­cises that are easy to learn on one’s own to self-hypnosis that must ini­tially be taught by a qual­i­fied pro­fes­sional. Other relax­ation tech­niques include med­i­ta­tion, pro­gres­sive mus­cle relax­ation, guided imagery, biofeedback.

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Many doc­tors rec­om­mend heat and/or cold treat­ments to reduce rheuma­toid arthri­tis symptoms.

Cold com­presses reduce joint swelling and inflam­ma­tion. You can apply a cool com­press or cold pack to the affected joint dur­ing an RA flare-up to help ease inflam­ma­tion and pain.

You don’t want to overdo cold treat­ments. Apply the cold com­press for 15 min­utes at a time with at least a 30-minute break in between treat­ments.

Heat com­presses relax your mus­cles and stim­u­late blood flow.

To use heat ther­apy, you can try a moist heat­ing pad or a warm, damp towel. Many peo­ple like using Nature Cre­ation heat nat­ural packs. Don’t go too hot. Your skin should not burn.

You can also use heat ther­apy by stand­ing in the shower. Let­ting the warm water hit the painful area on your body may help ease pain.

A hot tub is a good way to relax stiff mus­cles — and it’s enjoy­able. (Cau­tion: Avoid hot tubs or spas if you have high blood pres­sure, heart dis­ease, or are pregnant.)

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If stress is not han­dled prop­erly, more seri­ous ill­nesses may result.

How Seri­ous a Threat to Your Health is Stress?

Many believe that prac­ti­cally every ill­ness has stress reac­tion as a con­tribut­ing fac­tor. Some­one who han­dles stress well just sim­ply doesn’t get sick.

How often are the times you have caught a cold or flu also been times when you were wor­ried or stressed about some­thing more than nor­mal, or even deal­ing with some kind of trauma?

This is why it is wise to remem­ber what­ever reme­dies you choose for tem­po­rary relief, there must in addi­tion be con­scious work toward releas­ing stress pat­terns and habits that keep the worry mode, or anx­i­ety in place.

Here’s some­thing to think about. Is stress dif­fer­ent today than it was a few decades ago? Con­tem­po­rary stress tends to be more per­va­sive, per­sis­tent and insid­i­ous because it stems pri­mar­ily from psy­cho­log­i­cal rather than phys­i­cal threats. It is asso­ci­ated with ingrained and imme­di­ate reac­tions over which we have no con­trol and were orig­i­nally designed to be ben­e­fi­cial such as:

* The heart rate and blood pres­sure soar to increase the flow of blood to the brain to improve deci­sion mak­ing.
* The blood sugar rises to fur­nish more fuel for energy as the result of the break­down of glyco­gen, fat and pro­tein stores.
* The blood is shunted away from the gut, where its not imme­di­ately needed for pur­poses of diges­tion. It goes to the large mus­cles of the arms and legs to pro­vide more strength in com­bat, or greater speed in get­ting away from a scene of poten­tial peril.
* Also clot­ting occurs more quickly to pre­vent blood loss from lac­er­a­tions or inter­nal hemorrhage.

These and myr­iad of other imme­di­ate and auto­matic responses have been exquis­itely honed over the lengthy course of human evo­lu­tion as life sav­ing mea­sures to facil­i­tate prim­i­tive man’s abil­ity to deal with phys­i­cal challenges.

How­ever, the nature of stress for mod­ern man is not an occa­sional con­fronta­tion with a saber-toothed tiger or a hos­tile war­rior but rather a host of emo­tional threats like get­ting stuck in traf­fic and fights or mis­un­der­stand­ings with cus­tomers, co-workers, or fam­ily mem­bers, that often occur sev­eral times a day.

Unfor­tu­nately, our bod­ies still react with these same, archaic fight or flight responses that are not only use­ful­ness but poten­tially dam­ag­ing and deadly. Repeat­edly invoked, it is not hard to see how they can con­tribute to hyper­ten­sion, strokes, heart attacks, dia­betes, ulcers, neck or low back pain and other “Dis­eases of Civ­i­liza­tion.“

Feel­ing a Bit Stressed These Days?

You’re not alone! Traf­fic jams, dead­lines, bills to pay, job changes, end­less chores and errands, rela­tion­ships, fam­ily prob­lems, it’s always some­thing and of course we are on the brink of war.

Stress is expe­ri­enced by every­one at one time or another. It requires the body to make phys­i­cal and chem­i­cal adjust­ments in order to main­tain the nec­es­sary phys­i­o­log­i­cal bal­ance for sur­vival. A rac­ing heart, a burst of energy, and mus­cle ten­sion are the body’s phys­i­cal responses to stress. When faced with dan­ger, some of the first stress reac­tions are a rise in blood pres­sure, quicker breath­ing and heart beat, and dilated pupils. Sight and hear­ing become more alert.

This reac­tion is an instinc­tive response that pro­tects us from threats to our sur­vival. Phys­i­o­log­i­cal changes are part of the “fight or flight” response, which pre­pares and ener­gizes a per­son to con­front or flee from dan­ger. After the threat has passed or a change takes place, the “alarm” signs dis­ap­pear. The body is still aroused but is adapt­ing to the change.

When you “gear up” under stress, your body begins to do more of some things and less of oth­ers. For exam­ple, blood cir­cu­la­tion increases, but diges­tion slows down or even stops. First symp­toms of these diges­tive orders may be Per­sis­tent Indi­ges­tion or Colitis.

Once the stress ends, your body goes to work to restore the bal­ance. How­ever, if stress returns too soon, your body will never have time to get back on an even keel. Even­tu­ally, this can lead to major health prob­lems. Exhaus­tion occurs, caus­ing dam­age to the person’s phys­i­cal and emo­tional well-being. If the stress is short-term, chances are good that it can be dealt with. It is long-term stress that causes the body to break down and has many real phys­i­cal effects.

Some of the dis­or­ders asso­ci­ated with stress are:

* Anx­i­ety
* High blood pres­sure
* Headaches
* Depres­sion
* Weak­ened Immune Sys­tem
* Higher Cho­les­terol Lev­els
* Sleep­less­ness
* Impo­tence
* Migraine Headaches
* Diar­rhea
* Loss of Appetite
* Increased Appetite

If stress is not han­dled prop­erly, then more seri­ous ill­nesses will result.

There is no escape from stress. You must learn how to han­dle it.

Relax­ation is often dif­fi­cult. But nec­es­sary to alle­vi­ate the stress. Nature Cre­ation (www.naturecreation.com) is one com­pany who man­u­fac­tures nat­ural herbal ther­apy packs. The prod­ucts are filled with 9 essen­tial nat­ural herbs, which the essence of scents will bring nat­ural relax­ation stim­u­la­tion to your brain. In addi­tion, the prod­ucts can also be used as hot or cold ther­apy. These are excel­lent if you have mus­cle stiff­ness, body pain, headache, cramps or awk­ward twist of your nerves.

The design of Nature Cre­ation prod­ucts are ergonom­i­cally fit com­fort­ably to the con­tour of your body. There are 18 patented shapes and sizes and five unique col­ors to choose.

Please visit the com­pany web­site to learn more of the prod­ucts and all the benefits.

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The over­all qual­i­ties of warmth and heat have long been asso­ci­ated with com­fort and relax­ation, heat ther­apy goes a step fur­ther and can pro­vide both pain relief and heal­ing ben­e­fits for many types of back pain. In addi­tion, heat ther­apy for back pain is both inex­pen­sive and easy to do.

How heat ther­apy works
Many episodes of lower back pain result from strains and over-exertions, cre­at­ing ten­sion in the mus­cles and soft tis­sues around the lower spine. As a result, this restricts proper cir­cu­la­tion and sends pain sig­nals to the brain.

Mus­cle spasm in the lower back can cre­ate sen­sa­tions that may range from mild dis­com­fort to excru­ci­at­ing lower back pain. Heat ther­apy can help relieve pain from the mus­cle spasm and related tight­ness in the lower back.

Heat ther­apy appli­ca­tion can help pro­vide back pain relief through sev­eral mechanisms:

* Heat ther­apy dilates the blood ves­sels of the mus­cles sur­round­ing the lum­bar spine. This process increases the flow of oxy­gen and nutri­ents to the mus­cles, help­ing to heal the dam­aged tis­sue.
* Heat stim­u­lates the sen­sory recep­tors in the skin, which means that apply­ing heat to the lower back will decrease trans­mis­sions of pain sig­nals to the brain and par­tially relieve the dis­com­fort.
* Heat appli­ca­tion facil­i­tates stretch­ing the soft tis­sues around the spine, includ­ing mus­cles, con­nec­tive tis­sue, and adhe­sion. Con­se­quently, with heat ther­apy, there will be a decrease in stiff­ness as well as injury, with an increase in flex­i­bil­ity and over­all feel­ing of com­fort. Flex­i­bil­ity is very impor­tant for a healthy back.

There are sev­eral other sig­nif­i­cant ben­e­fits of heat ther­apy that make it so appeal­ing. Com­pared to most ther­a­pies, heat ther­apy is quite inex­pen­sive. Heat ther­apy is also easy to do — it can be done at home while relax­ing, and also make it an option while at work or in the car.

For many peo­ple, heat ther­apy works best when com­bined with other treat­ment modal­i­ties, such as phys­i­cal ther­apy and exer­cise. Rel­a­tive to most med­ical treat­ments avail­able, heat ther­apy is appeal­ing to many peo­ple because it is a non-invasive and non-pharmaceutical form of back pain relief

How to Apply Heat Therapy

The most effec­tive heat ther­apy prod­uct is Nature Cre­ation Herbal Pack. They can main­tain their heat at the proper tem­per­a­ture. “Warm” is the proper tem­per­a­ture. Patients should not have their heat source be hot to the point of burn­ing the skin. The desired effect is for the heat to pen­e­trate down into the mus­cles. Sim­ply increas­ing the tem­per­a­ture of the skin will do lit­tle to decrease discomfort.

In many instances, the longer the heat is applied, the bet­ter. The dura­tion that one needs to apply the heat, though, is based on the type of and/or mag­ni­tude of the injury. For very minor back ten­sion, short amounts of heat ther­apy may be suf­fi­cient (such as 15 to 20 min­utes). For more intense injuries, longer ses­sions of heat may be more ben­e­fi­cial (such as 30 min­utes to 2 hours, or more).

Two options of heat ther­apy include moist heat and dry heat.

* Dry heat, draw out mois­ture from the body and may leave the skin dehy­drated. How­ever, some peo­ple feel that dry heat is the eas­i­est to apply and feels the best.

* Moist heat, steamed or moist heat­ing packs can aid in the heat’s pen­e­tra­tion into the mus­cles, and some peo­ple feel that moist heat pro­vides bet­ter pain relief.

Nature Cre­ation prod­ucts can be used as dry heat and moist heat treatments.

Finally, it is impor­tant to use enough insu­la­tion between the heat source and the skin to avoid over­heat­ing or burn­ing the skin.

Please note that heat should not be used in cer­tain cir­cum­stances. For exam­ple, if the lower back is swollen or bruised, heat should not be used. Patients should con­sult doc­tors if they have heart dis­ease or hyper­ten­sion. Heat appli­ca­tion is also not suit­able in the fol­low­ing cases:

* Der­mati­tis
* Deep vein throm­bo­sis
* Dia­betes
* Periph­eral vas­cu­lar dis­ease
* Open wound
* Severe cog­ni­tive impairment

In gen­eral, if the injured area is swollen or bruised it is bet­ter to apply cold treat­ment to reduce the inflam­ma­tion or swelling.

In sum­mary, heat ther­apy is an easy and inex­pen­sive option to pro­vide relief from many forms of back pain. It may be used alone or in con­junc­tion with other ther­a­pies. Because it is so sim­ple, it is often over­looked and physi­cians may for­get to men­tion it, but heat ther­apy used in the right way can be a valu­able part of many back pain treat­ment programs.

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