This question has come up in our household again - ( you see, our son has a propensity for hurting himself via his athletic endevors - skiing, skateboarding, rollerblading, you name it). It’s his foot this time. He twisted it or something while skiing (flipping or spinning, I can’t get a straight answer). Next week is a big competition where he can earn prizes while mangling himself. So he wants to get better fast.
We’ve all gone thru some similar type (sprain ?) injury at sometime in our athletic lives.
My Questions:
Is it better to apply a hot or cold compress?
Is there any value to re-applying a compress each night?
What is the best course of action to a quick cure?
The conventional wisdom is ice for the first 48hrs then heat. If there is no logic talking to him then use atheletic tape to wrap it properly if you can’t do it get it done. An inproper tape job can be aas bad as no support
I don’t know exactly what you mean by a compress, but, when we would get ankles sprained, we had to put them in a salty ice water slush bath until our foot felt like a block of ice. Let it recover, and do it again. Twice in a day…that’s four times being frozen. Twice the next day, too. The third day, we went to heat and ultrasound. The fourth day: heat, ultrasound, electrostimulation. If that doesn’t get it well in a week, you’ve got a Really bad thing going.
As far as a generalization, cold is usually thought of as inappropriate for chronic connective tissue injuries, such as an achilles, prior to working out. Other than that, you can always find someone that will recommend cold at all stages of treatment, though most people recommend warmth before a workout followed by ice afterward. That’s what I tend to do.
For the first 48-72 hrs use ice. The reason is to close down ruptured capillaries in an acute injury and prevent swelling caused by fluid around the area.