When the backs of your upper thighs are too tight, your lower back has to work in overtime, in order to compensate. While it is not something that back pain sufferers always consider, your hamstring muscles can play a key role in whether or not your lower back joints become over-stressed. As a general rule, ice packs and heating pads are good all-around options, as both are effective, inexpensive, and readily available. Your physical therapist can also recommend the best types of hot or cold remedies for your specific condition. However, cold packs can also come to the rescue with their ability to numb pain, halt spasms, and reduce swelling in the affected area.ĭuring physical therapy, you’ll receive expert applications of these ice and heat therapies. Hot compresses and packs also ease pain by blocking the painful “signals” that run from the nerves in your lower back to your brain. Heat works to increase your circulation, and when your body experiences that extra blood flow, your healing properties are initiated in your bloodstream. If you prefer one remedy over the other, it is not necessary to alternate every time, but often alternating the two extremes can help provide a fuller range of benefits. Alternating between hot and cold remedies.Īlternating hot and cold compresses or packs on your lower back can help in providing significant pain relief. Your physical therapist will work closely with you provide simple pain-relief strategies that you can carry into your daily life, even after your treatment sessions are complete.

Additionally, physical therapy focuses not only on the pain you are currently facing, but also on preventing your pain from returning in the future. Fortunately, physical therapy can be that very solution.Ī study published by BMC Health Services states that physical therapy has been known to prevent habit-forming dependencies on prescription medication and reduce the overall health cost that a patient will have to pay for pain relief. While it may seem simple to relieve the pain with prescription medications, our current opioid epidemic has left people in search of less harmful solutions.

If you have been living with lower back pain, you know how limiting it can be.

How to relive lower back pain