Treating Muscle Spasms That Are Caused by Pinched Nerves
Painful and debilitating – just two words that can be used to describe how uncomfortable and destressing pinched nerves are.
Not only may the affected area induce a numb sensation, but you may also experience sharp, shooting pains when you move your body into a particular position.
And when these pinched nerves are located in your back, muscle spasms may also become a problem, increasing your symptoms and pain.
What Causes Pinched Nerves and Muscle Spasms?
There are a variety of causes of pinched nerves including bone spurs (arising as a result of arthritis of the spine) and herniated discs in the spine. Equally, if you have carpal tunnel syndrome, this causes a “bottleneck” that may result in pinched nerves.
Regardless of whether the nerve is being pinched, though, many patients will experience the same symptoms – muscle spasms and numb, tingling sensations.
Often, it’ll be in your hand where you start to notice the numbness, even if the carpal tunnel isn’t the problem. This is because your brain’s unable to establish the part of your affected nerve.
What Are the Symptoms?
Alongside this numb sensation, you may find you have pains running down your legs, particularly if you have a pinched nerve in your back. As these symptoms also radiate down the leg, they are often deemed “referred pain.”
And, as we’ve already seen, muscle spasms are a key indicator of pinched nerves that are located in the back. Nevertheless, you may only notice a numbness or weakness in your arm or leg – and there may be no pain associated with this.
Other symptoms to look out for include burning, electric, tingling, and hot/cold sensations.
Treating Pinched Nerves
For those whose symptoms have heightened throughout the day or that have only just started to arise, relief can often be found through various self-care therapies.
For example, your nerve may be under more pressure than usual due to muscle strain or spasms, which is why you need to relax these muscles. Having a massage, taking a hot bath or shower, and switching from ice to heat every 20 minutes can help.
For most, arranging an appointment with a local chiropractor in Atlanta is incredibly effective.
The manual adjustments chiropractors carry out help reduce any pressure on the nerves, which not only alleviates your symptoms but increases the flexibility and support your back is getting from the surrounding areas.
A lot of people find that these unmedicated, non-surgical therapies work well and eradicate any pain entirely.
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