Contrast therapy uses the alternate application of heat and cold to a painful muscle or inflamed area to speed healing from injuries, reduce inflammation, and reduce pain. It's great for helping with sprained ankles, swollen knees, swollen elbows, swollen ankles, plantar fascitis, shin splints, tennis elbow, and other common but painful problems.

It easy to do at home, and free.

But most important, it often has spectacular therapeutic effects! For many conditions, it's far more effective than just heat or cold alone.

When I first learned to do it, I performed it on one foot/ankle, immersing it in a pan of cold water, then a pan of hot water, a minute each back and forth for about ten minutes, finishing with cold water. When I was done, I was amazed to see how much smaller the treated ankle looked than the other. I hadn't even realized that my ankles were swollen--but they clearly had been, as I could see from the non-treated ankle, which looked puffy by comparison.

Yet few people seem to know about contrast therapy. I'm out to change that!

When to Use Contrast Therapy
Here are some things you can use hot-and-cold therapy for:

• swollen ankles, knees, elbows, wrists
• sprained ankles and other sprains
• shin splints
• carpal tunnel syndrome
• plantar fascitis

When Not to Use Contrast Therapy
You should not use hot-and-cold therapy in the following cases:

• recent injuries (0-72 hours) that are still painful to touch, hot, and/or swollen
• bruises
• wounds or broken skin
• if you have reduced sensation in the body part
• if you have a heart condition or hypertension
• if you have diabetes
• if you have deep vein thrombosis
• if you have peripheral vascular disease
• if you have rheumatoid arthritis
• if you have Raynaud's Syndrome
• if you have a cold-allergic condition
• if you are paralyzed
• if you are under the influence of drugs or alcohol
• if you have any other serious medical condition (Talk to your doctor about it first!)

How to Do Contrast Therapy
Hot-and-cold therapy is easy. There are different ways you can do it. You may have to experiment and find out what works best for you.

The basic rules are:

• Alternately immerse the affected body part in hot and cold water, or apply hot and cold packs, to heat and then cool the affected part. (Immersion is most effective but not always practical.)
• For immersion, each dip into the cold or the hot water should be about a minute. If you're using hot/cold packs, make each application about 5 minutes (because it's less effective than immersion.)
• The entire session should be about 10 minutes, up to twice a day.
• Hot should be warm but not burning hot. Cold should have ice cubes in it.
• Start and finish with cold!

Methods

• Swollen Hands, Wrists, Elbows: Immersion in a double sink works best, with hot water in one side and cold in the other.

• Swollen Feet or Ankles: For your lower limbs, try using pans or buckets of hot and cold water. A removable shower head would also work.

• Upper legs and Hips: You could try a sitz bath, but hot and cold packs or the removable shower head are probably the easiest for these body parts.

How Contrast Therapy Works
Heat dilates blood vessels, while cold constricts them. One theory of why contrast therapy works is that this opening and closing acts like a pump, squeezing blood and lymphatic fluid out of the swollen body part.

Recent research has called this theory into question, but I know from personal experience that something about it dramatically works to reduce swelling!

And with the reduced swelling come faster healing and reduction of pain and discomfort. Particularly in situations where an injured body part just won't heal completely, such as often happens with a sprained ankle, hot-and-cold therapy can make all the difference.

If it's just plain ice therapy you need, you can learn about it here.

Or if it's heat therapy you're seeking, you can learn about it here.

Return from Contrast Therapy to Ice or Heat main page.

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