Next Level Injury Care: Alternatives to Ice and "Vitamin I"

Summer is a time of increased activity-- and we really hope you're getting out there and making the most of it! Being active is the best way to stay healthy, young and happy.

With increased activity comes the occasional trauma or repetitive strain. Many are familiar with the classic RICE protocol for injuries-- "rest, ice, compression and elevation." Often we observe patients instead practicing the "Double I" protocol-- "ice and ibuprofin." But is this truly the fastest way to get back in gear?

​You may have heard us gently preach about ibuprofin and other NSAIDs once or twice before. The side effects of this class of drugs are not to be accepted casually: bleeding ulcers, tinnitus and hearing loss, and kidney damage are only the major ones. Some 100,000 people are hospitalized annually for NSAID-provoked GI issues alone, and some 16,500 of these patients actually die. On a sub-clinical level, these drugs have been shown to cause micro-lesions in the GI tract, contributing to such disorders as leaky gut, IBS and systemic inflammation.

Even worse, NSAIDs may not speed the healing of your injury at all. By interrupting your natural inflammatory response to tissue damage, which plays an important role in the early phases of healing, they may actually impede the normal arc of injury recovery.

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