Steroids And Pain Management Do Not Mix
While steroid injections can often be a “quick fix” for pain, they often accelerate the progression of the disease the patient is suffering from.
Still, thousands of medical practitioners and physicians around the globe continue to give their patients steroid injections because they say it makes them feel good, at least for the time being anyway. However, a momentary state of euphoria is not justification enough to put the patient through the multiple risk factors associated with steroids.< Healthcare physicians and patients alike need to consider the risks and ramifications of steroid injections, especially when it comes to short-term pain management. What follows is an attempt to bring awareness to the medical community, both on the doctor’s and patient’s side, about the potential dangers of steroid injections.
Risks of Steroid Injections
The most common form of steroid injection for pain comes in the form of corticosteroids, which are most commonly injected right into the patient’s joints. One of the biggest problems with these injections is that the body is not used to such a high dose of hormones at one go and so the joints along with many of the cells get affected and react accordingly by deteriorating and dying off. In essence, the disease which caused the pain in the first place gets worse.
Some of the other common health ramifications of steroid injections include:
- Killing cartilage cells
- Destroying stem cells
- Increasing the risk of fractures in senior citizens
- Increasing the risk of osteonecrosis (bone disease)
- Disturbing the stress-management system of the body
- Damaging tendons
- Damaging cartilage
The Case For Steroid Injections
Although the above risks are well-known to almost all physicians supporting steroid injections, they still consider the short-term pain reduction and energy boost to be the decisive factor in its use.
As a patient, however, one must weigh the scales when it comes to short-term relief and long-term health disabilities. Is it really worth it to feel good today only to suffer from more ailments tomorrow?
As for the doctors, they should try to think outside of the box a little and not just go for those treatments, like steroid injections, that are covered by insurance and instead look for more dynamic and regenerative medical breakthroughs, which are continuously being discovered almost on a daily basis.
In the end, the doctor should do what is in the best interest of the patient and the patient should agree to the treatment that is the best interest of their health, even when that goes against the grain of traditional medicine.
If Steroids Is A Must, Then Use The Right Dose
If both the doctor and patient ultimately agree that steroids are the best treatment for pain management at the moment then knowing and using the correct dosage is a must.
Just what is the correct dosage? Studies have shown that steroids can influence pain receptors in the tens to hundreds of nanogram range, yet most of the steroid injections given today for pain management are almost a million times more than this. The worst part is that these high-dose ranges kill off cells, making the disease progressively worse as time goes on.
PRP – An Alternative To Steroid Injections
Patient Rich Plasma Therapy (PRP) uses platelets, the body’s way of regenerating and repairing damaged tissue, to accelerate the healing process.
Through PRP Therapy, doctors are able to separate platelets from the red blood cells and so increase growth factors and stimulation of stem cells at a higher level than what the body is normally capable of. In doing so, the affected area undergoes a rapid repair process that is often accompanied by a quick dose of pain relief.
The entire process takes only 30 minutes and the effects are long-lasting. The best thing of all, there are no long-term health risks of using this form of therapy as there are with steroid injections.
If you would like more information about PRP injections and therapy or would like to find out more about the qualification process, you can contact us here: https://orthopedicprp.com/contact-us/
