Infection
Developing a cough and/or cold is bad enough without having to deal with their painful symptoms. These symptoms typically include shivering, fever, headache and a sore throat. Besides, your body can also ache and feel sore when you are down with an infection. Often, these aches and pains in the body are dull and continuous all over the body, offering no respite or rest.
Your body pains are actually a sign that your body is fighting off the illness – you will experience aches when the immune system releases chemicals into your body to help fight off the infection. These chemicals shoot signals to your brain, which you interpret as pain.
More complex problems
However, not all body aches and pains can be explained away this simplistically – other types of body aches and pains can result from complex, long-term health problems. For example, a person suffering from nerve pain (or neuropathic pain) can experience pain when the signalling systems in the spinal cord and brain get damaged. The signalling systems shoot erratic signals, which the body interprets as aches, pains and other sensations such as tingling and numbness.
How do I relieve body aches and pains?
The thumb rule in understanding and managing pain is: If it hurts, there’s something that needs urgent attention underneath! Pain is an early alarm system for your body, so it alerts you to address the source of the pain as fast as you can. It could be as simple as rearranging your office seating area, to improving your posture, so that you can reduce strain (and resulting aches) in your hands, elbows, arms and wrists.
If you already have a muscle strain or sprain:
- Rest the painful part of the body.
- Take immediate steps to reduce swelling and inflammation – follow the PRICE (Protect,Rest, Ice, Compress, Elevate) principle or take a topical pain reliever such as Moov, alongside the PRICE treatment.
- Heat therapy soothes long-standing or even chronic pain.
- Gentle exercises like walking or swimming improve the body’s responses and circulatory systems.
When you should be concerned about aches and pains
In most cases, sufficient rest, gentle exercise and a healthy diet can certainly reduce and eliminate body aches and pains. Topical pain relievers, such as Moov, can provide temporary respite from the various aches and pains in the body, so that your normal life is not hampered.
But if the ache is a constant factor in your life, so much so that it becomes a hindrance against normal functioning, it is time to get a doctor’s opinion on the matter, for it could be due to a long-term medical condition like diabetes or arthritis. Generally, any pain that persists after a couple of days must be brought to the notice of the doctor.