When your legs hurt and swell, it causes a lot of inconvenience and is a medical problem - a symptom of one of the diseases. This condition is preceded by many factors, for example, sleep disturbances, poor diet, and joint pathologies. When swelling and pain in the legs recur quite often, you should consult a specialist. Swelling can signal the development of serious pathologies in the body and requires immediate medical intervention.
The reasons for a swollen leg or pain can be hidden in a variety of pathologies and conditions, based on them, symptoms and the degree of localization appear.
This is the most likely possible reason; with the development of arthrosis and arthritis, a degenerative process occurs in the joints, accompanied by swelling and pain. As a result of a swollen limb, normal fluid circulation is blocked, which leads to stagnation. In the mornings and late afternoons, the patient may feel a nagging pain in the joint area and below. If you separate, swelling and pain in the legs decrease, but in the evening they return again, possibly in several joints at the same time. Additional symptoms are redness and a local increase in temperature of the affected area.
Impacts and sprains lead to swelling and pain in the legs. This is due to the fact that physiological fluid accumulates at the site of injury.
Swelling and pain in the legs are most often accompanied by redness of the skin.
Often, the legs hurt and swell in elderly patients or athletes who incorrectly calculate the load. Intense jogging and excessive physical exercise lead to swelling of the legs and severe discomfort, which intensifies when walking.
Due to the development of varicose veins or chronic atherosclerosis, the legs become swollen and painful. Pathologies cause the gaps in the blood vessels to narrow, and blood and cerebrospinal fluid stagnate in the legs. As a result of atherosclerosis, plaques form in the walls of the arteries, which, if broken off, can cause serious harm to health.
Varicose veins and atherosclerosis contribute to stagnation of blood in the veins and arteries, which leads to poor circulation, and legs that hurt and swell when walking. Every day the patient suffers from discomfort, additionally cramps appear, especially in the morning, swelling and pain envelop the entire calf muscle.
Another reason why there may be puffiness in the lower extremities - malignant and benign tumors, as well as growing metastases, lead to blockage of the circulatory system, stagnation of lymph, resulting in swollen legs and pain.
It is important to know that with this pathology, swelling often spreads to only one limb.
If your leg is swollen and hurts, this may be the result of an allergy to insect bites, food, household chemicals, cosmetics, or taking new medications. Locally, the leg can swell very quickly and increase in volume if contact with the allergen is not eliminated in time.
When the legs swell and hurt due to an allergic reaction, a rash and redness of the skin also appear. After long walks or heavy lifting, the discomfort and “lumbago” at the site of swelling intensifies significantly. In difficult cases, with prolonged allergies, swelling can grow into surrounding tissues and internal organs.
If your lower back hurts and your legs are swollen, this may be due to improper functioning of the kidneys. When the organ responsible for removing fluid from the body stops working normally, then the legs swell and hurt, but the pain is insignificant. Kidney dysfunction or renal failure provokes the appearance of swelling on the face, and then the puffiness spreads to the limbs. What to do and how to treat the problem should be prescribed by a doctor after a thorough diagnosis.
Heart failure is a disease that often causes one or both legs to become swollen and painful. In this case, they become cold and numb in the morning and evening. Often after sleep there is swelling on the legs, spreading to the arms and face. Obvious symptoms are concomitant shortness of breath and pain in the heart area.
One of the reasons why legs swell and hurt is gout. This means that normal metabolism is dysfunctional in the body. In this case, salts and urea accumulate in the joints, then the skin turns red, swelling appears, severe pain and a local increase in temperature occur.
If your lower back hurts and your legs are swollen, the cause may be an injury to the lower spine or a hernia forms, difficult movement of blood and cerebrospinal fluid occurs, and blood vessels are pinched. As a result, swelling and cutting, shooting sensations appear. If the causes of leg pain and swelling are injuries, numbness and cramps may be added to the symptoms. Discomfort is directed from the spine and goes down, localized in one of the limbs.
It cannot be that your leg is swollen and hurts for no reason. Swelling is a symptom and is always caused by pathological or physiological factors. At the first manifestations of painful sensations, it is better not to self-medicate; you should seek help from a qualified specialist; in this case, patients are sent for mandatory examination.
There are a number of conditions in which consultation with a doctor should occur immediately to prevent the development of complications:
When the legs swell and hurt, the causes and treatment are interconnected after collecting anamnesis, ultrasound, x-rays and additional tests, the specialist will prescribe effective treatment.
If your legs swell, you should consult a doctor, but it is not always possible to do this very quickly.
Important! When your legs hurt and swell, you should never prescribe medications or diuretics yourself. This may cause complications to develop.
In this case, the doctor prescribes drugs, depending on the causes, the severity of the pathology and the personal characteristics of the patient.
If the leg swells, it is necessary to undergo an examination by a traumatologist, an x-ray, and depending on the nature of the injury, treatment will be prescribed. Bed rest is considered mandatory; the swollen leg must be immobilized and provided with complete rest. If the limbs swell due to sprained ligaments, a cold compress on the leg, as well as decongestant ointments “Gepatrombin” will help the bruise.
In this case, you should initially consult a therapist; you may need an examination and examination by a cardiologist. Regardless of the results, it is necessary to reduce the intensity of the load. When one or both limbs swell, treatment will include diuretics, for example, Veroshpiron.
These diseases are dealt with by a rheumatologist or orthopedist; the patient will need to undergo an examination of the synovial fluid, take an x-ray and donate blood and urine for analysis.
Depending on the disease, antibiotics are prescribed, for example, Dexamethasone, as well as various drugs based on Diclofenac. When the legs swell, the patient must lead a healthy lifestyle and systematically attend a course of exercise therapy as prescribed by a specialist. In complex, advanced cases, joint replacement is prescribed.
With the development of atherosclerosis and varicose veins, the use of compression garments, as well as specialized tonic gels to further strengthen blood vessels, is considered mandatory. It is recommended to take a massage course and do some physical exercise. Phlebotonics, such as Venarus and decongestant ointment Troxevasin, are definitely prescribed. If drug treatment does not produce positive effects, surgery will be required.
After confirming the diagnosis based on the results of urine tests, examination, and medical history, diuretic medications are prescribed, for example, Furosemide, Veroshpiron. If your legs are very swollen, additional therapy depends on the specific disease that caused the problem.
Therapy for swelling in heart failure and other pathologies of the cardiovascular system includes medications, diet therapy, and physiotherapeutic methods.
Complex treatment also consists of the use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs: Asparkam, Indomethacin.
Also hormonal medications, for example, Prednisolone. Depending on the indications, it would be useful to take diuretics that help remove swelling, such as Veroshpiron or Furosemide. Patients with such diseases are prescribed vitamin therapy and dietary nutrition.
Provide complete rest to the swollen limb, cover the affected area with ice and wrap it in a dry cloth. It is recommended to drink plenty of fluids and place your leg in such a way that it is suspended. To cope with swelling of the limb, according to the doctor’s recommendations, it is necessary to take drugs from the NSAID group, such as Diclofenac, Ibuprofen, and use Fulflex ointment in therapy.
After contacting a neurologist and surgeon, the patient is sent for CT and MRI to determine the specific location of the spinal injury. In the future, treatment of edema will require surgical intervention, subsequent treatment with blockers, antibiotics, etc.
What to do and what course of therapy to choose should be recommended by the doctor based on your medical history and test results.
For complex treatment, it would be useful to use non-traditional treatment methods:
Therapeutic gymnastics, for example, the “scissors” exercise and other complexes that a physiotherapist will develop, can also cope with this problem. To prevent your legs from hurting, physical therapy is an excellent solution at any age. If the situation is not neglected, daily massages and gymnastics help alleviate the condition.
Your leg is swollen and it hurts; your doctor will be the best person to tell you what to do. You may need drug treatment or you may be able to limit yourself to folk remedies. Do not waste time, seek advice from a specialist who will correctly develop a treatment regimen. This will help quickly resolve the problem and prevent complications.
All people often experience pain in the knee joint.
In a normal state, a person does not experience any discomfort, but pain in the knee when bending is quite common and there is nothing terrible about it. Knee joints are exposed to increased stress every day, for this reason, if they are painful, you should not panic. Knee injuries can occur during active recreation, sports, and household activities that involve physical activity.
In the human body, the knee joint is the largest, it is located at the junction of the tibia, fibula and femur. Ligaments, muscles, and tendons hold the bones of the knee and hip together. The menisci act as shock absorbers and are also responsible for lateral mobility of the knee. Free movement and protection from shock loads are provided by articular cartilage.
What to do when your knees hurt? You will learn about this later in the article, but for now we will talk about what causes knee pain?
Knees are subject to constant stress throughout a person’s life, so disruptions in their functioning cause pain. Pain syndromes in the knee can be caused by many reasons, and the pain itself can have different manifestations: chronic, acute.
The main causes of knee pain include rheumatoid arthritis, arthrosis and post-traumatic arthritis. Osteoarthritis is a degenerative disease that progresses very slowly, causing the wear and tear of articular cartilage. Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis of the knee joints. The development of arthrosis can be caused by a variety of reasons.
rheumatoid arthritis as a cause of knee pain
A torn meniscus can also cause knee pain. As mentioned above, the knee joint consists of three bones, between which the meniscus is located. Thanks to it, shock loads are absorbed by the knee. Under particularly heavy loads, the meniscus ruptures.
The inflammatory process of tendon tissue - tendinitis - also causes pain. A patellar tendon tear can occur due to excess weight, muscle imbalance, or muscle strain. With multiple ruptures, inflammation begins.
Leg pain that occurs below the knee can be caused by excessive exercise or anatomical weakness. The area under the knee is made up of bones, ligaments and tendons. Due to the lack of stabilizing structures there, this area is susceptible to increased injury. The tendons, nerves, cartilage and blood vessels located under the knee are easily destroyed and for this reason can often cause pain under the knee.
Twisting or direct stress can also cause pain behind the knee. Direct loads include collisions and injuries, which may result in cracks or bruises.
Knee pain can be caused by excessive exercise
Wear and tear and age are obvious causes of pain behind the knee. Over time, cartilage, ligaments and bones lose their strength, which will naturally cause pain syndromes. To prevent pain behind the knee, and avoid the development of pathologies such as nerve degeneration, diabetes and arthritis, you should regularly exercise moderately, eat right and give the body enough time to rest. The muscle tone of the lower leg can be improved by cycling and running.
So why do your knees hurt? This question interests many. Let's consider what pathologies provoke pain in the knees.
Injuries and various degenerative-dystrophic processes are the main causes of pain in the knee joint. They, in turn, provoke various systemic diseases of the body and inflammatory processes of periarticular and articular tissues.
1. Acute arthrosis. The causes of gonarthrosis can be metabolic disorders in the body, excess weight, dehydration, impaired local circulation - all this causes a deficiency of synovial fluid in the joint. As a result of the above changes, increased bone friction and thinning of cartilage tissue occur. With osteoarthritis, pain in the knee joint is accompanied by limited mobility of the joint. Increased pain is provoked by squats, loads, walking, running, and carrying heavy objects. To reduce pain at the back of the knee, the following can be used: moxotherapy, treatment with chondroprotectors, acupressure and acupuncture. This therapy promotes natural tissue regeneration, improves blood supply, stimulates metabolic processes, and improves motor activity of joints.
2. Drive (arthritis) - an inflammatory process that provokes pain in the knee joint. The causes of its occurrence include: rheumatoid arthritis, arthrosis, gouty drives, hypothermia. With arthritis, pain in the knee bothers you at rest and decreases when walking. Swelling of the knee joint, redness of the skin and increased temperature may be observed. Tibetan therapy helps stop the process of destruction of joint tissue, reduce pain, improve blood circulation and improve the immune system.
3. Problems with blood vessels can cause poor circulation in the knee, which will also be painful. The pain is aching and bilateral.
4. Inflammation of the knee tendons - accounts for 10–15% of all calls to specialists. The category most susceptible to pathology is women over 40 years of age. Pain occurs when carrying heavy objects or climbing stairs; calm walking does not provoke pain. Basically, the pain manifests itself only in the knee area (on their inner side). With periarthritis of the crow's foot, the mobility of the leg does not become impaired; it fully bends and unbends, does not deform and does not swell.
Inflammation of the knee tendons
5. Lumbosacral osteochondrosis, herniated intervertebral discs, protrusion. These pathologies provoke pinching of the nerve roots.
6. Enthesopathy, bursitis, tendobursitis, tendonitis. Inflammation of muscles, bursae, ligaments and tendons causes pain. The reasons for their formation can be injuries and increased stress on the joint.
7. When the knee joint is irreversibly damaged, endoprosthetics is performed, which can cause discomfort during the rehabilitation period. Acupressure and acupuncture are used for therapy. Laser therapy and shock wave therapy have analgesic and anti-inflammatory effects.
Other reasons include: coxarthrosis, salt deposition, arthrosis of the hip joints, osteoporosis, impaired liver functionality, disruption of the endocrine system, problems with the biliary tract.
Also, the causes of knee damage can be:
Traditional medicine against joint pain
Using folk remedies, any person relies on achieving the same result as with drug therapy: anti-inflammatory effects, improving metabolic processes in the body, relieving pain, improving cartilage tissue in the joint.
Below are some recipes used for damage to the knee joints:
Baking soda for knee pain
First of all, treatment for knee pain must begin with changing your habits. And especially with changes in the nutritional diet, because heavy weight only increases the load on the legs. Losing weight will help reduce the load on your legs and thereby reduce their pain.
Some experts believe that race walking can be used as a treatment. But this method has a lot of controversy, since when walking, the load on the leg does not decrease, which can lead to the opposite result. To treat knee pain, you can use walking in water, for the reason that in water there will not be such a large load on the legs.
To begin treatment, not everyone can afford such radical measures as weight loss, so you can wear a bandage, which will relieve pressure on the knee joint and reduce pain. The use of the bandage is recommended under the supervision of a doctor and on his recommendation. At the same time, you should remember that constantly wearing a bandage provokes the development of muscle weakness.
Anti-inflammatory drugs. The most effective drugs in this group are Diclofenac, Ketoprofen and Indomethacin. Ibuprofen, Aspirin and Amidopyrine cope much worse with the elimination of pain syndromes. Taking into account the individual characteristics of the body, the effects of the above drugs may vary.
Despite the fact that NSAIDs are very effective for diseases of the knee joint, they also have a number of side effects on the body. This explains the prescription of such drugs for short periods and in small doses. What are the negative effects of taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs?
If you want to carry out treatment with these drugs, then you should definitely consult with a specialist and not self-medicate. Self-medication can only harm your health.
You should not take the drugs for a long enough period so as not to provoke disturbances in the functioning of the cardiac, gastric and renal systems.
Longer appointments are only possible under the constant supervision of a qualified physician.
The use of anti-inflammatory drugs should be carried out only in order to be able to carry out basic treatment of the knee joints without pain: massages, physiotherapeutic measures.
Chondroprotectors. These medications provoke increased formation of cartilage tissue in the joints and its protection. Chondroprotectors allow for improved nutrition of cartilage tissue and their gradual restoration.
This group includes the following medications: Chondroitin, Dona, Chondrolone, Artra, Terafrex, Zinaxin, Elbona, Structum, Artrin. The composition of these drugs, in one or another combination, includes substances such as glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate.
Chondrolone is a drug that is available in powder form in ampoules for subsequent intramuscular administration. To use, the ampoule must be diluted to 1 ml. water, course of treatment from 25 to 30 injections every other day.
The drug Structum is a mono drug containing 250 or 500 mg of chondroitin sulfate. The daily dose is 1000 mg per day.
A significant therapeutic effect will be visible when using medications directly into the cavity of the knee joint. With this method of administration, the medicine will enter directly into the synovial fluid, through which the cartilage tissue is nourished.
Anti-inflammatory corticosteroid hormones such as Celeston, Hydrocortisone, Flosterone, Kenalog and Diprospan are very often used. These medications are recommended for intra-articular administration due to the fact that their use in tablets gives many side effects. Introducing them into the joint allows you to quickly reduce the inflammatory process and pain in the joint.
Recently, the introduction of hyaluronic acid into the joint cavity has become quite common for treatment. It is like additional synovial fluid, allowing the joint to move less painfully and reduce its trauma. When administered, nutrition and hydration of cartilage tissue improves.
Hyaluronic acid for intra-articular injection is available in the following medicinal preparations: Ostenil, Fermathron, Sinvisc and Duralan. This treatment is quite expensive, so not everyone can afford it. For a therapeutic effect, a course of 3-4 injections into the affected joint is used once a week.
Medicines that are used locally also have a good therapeutic effect.
Menovazin, Fastum-gel, Diclofenac, Butadione ointment, Indomethacin ointment, Voltaren-gel are gels and ointments for knee pain that have proven themselves to be quite effective. They have a good effect on a painful joint, but when used in this way, only a small amount of the substance has a positive effect. For this reason, ointment therapy should be supplemented with medications used intramuscularly or orally.
Compresses can be used for treatment. Bishofite, medical bile, Dimexide - these drugs warm well, penetrate the skin and have absorbable properties. Drug therapy can be compared with physiotherapeutic procedures, massage, and spa treatment. On the recommendation of a specialist, you can use traditional methods for treatment.
In any case, it is not recommended to self-medicate so as not to worsen your condition. This is possible only after consulting a doctor.