MYALGIA: HOW TO RELIEVE MUSCLE PAIN
Myalgia is a symptom that manifests as muscle pain. This is how the name of this pathology is translated from Latin. Muscle pain can have different origins, but is most often assessed as aching or becoming oppressive.
Some sources mention myalgia as one of the types of myositis, but ICD-10 separates these diseases. Myalgia in this classification is indicated in paragraph M79.1, while myositis is allocated paragraph M60 and its subsections.
CAUSES OF MYALGIA
Most often, the cause of myalgia are injuries and overexertion (disproportionately heavy loads, incorrect training regime for athletes, etc.). But other factors can cause muscle pain: spinal pathology, arthritis, sciatica, stress, etc. Often, myalgia is provoked by infectious and viral diseases, such as influenza or SARS.
CLASSIFICATION AND TYPES OF MYALGIA
Although the international classification of diseases does not name individual varieties of myalgia, it is customary in the medical literature to distinguish several of its types. The etiology of myalgia is very diverse, which determines the key principles of classification.
Fibromyalgia is the most common type of myalgia. This is pain in the muscles, ligaments and tendons, most often affecting the cervical and occipital regions, the lower back and shoulder girdle. This type of myalgia has two subspecies:
a) primary (in this case, pain is greatly enhanced by palpation, overload, low temperatures);
b) secondary (pain is more stable in the strength of its manifestations).
Primary fibromyalgia is more common in women, especially with depression. Secondary fibromyalgia is a more “male” diagnosis and is usually the result of injuries or physical overstrain.
Myositis is an inflammation of muscle tissue that occurs against the background of any diseases. As already mentioned, the ICD-10 distinguishes these diagnoses, but a number of specialists still consider them overlapping. In addition, polymyositis can also be attributed here.
Bornholm disease (epidemic myalgia) is the pain that occurs when infected with the Coxsackie virus. Pain is localized in the back, neck, chest and arms, and they last about 3-5 days, in rare cases – about a week.
HOW IS MYALGIA MANIFESTED
Muscle pain is usually aching in nature and can increase with muscle tension. At the same time, myalgia may be accompanied by headache, nausea, fever (local or complete), joint tension, swelling.
DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT OF MYALGIA
The treatment of myalgia is reduced to the treatment of the disease that caused muscle pain. So, with “cold” myalgia, antipyretic drugs usually cope with pain. If the reason is stress – after taking sedatives, muscle pain also goes away.
Complex treatment is optimal. This is especially true in cases where the apparent cause of pain could not be established or myalgia was provoked by overexertion. In such situations, therapy is aimed at eliminating symptoms. The treatment is based on the use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and therapeutic massage courses.
If you have muscle pain quite often, you should pay attention to the sports regime. It may be worth paying more attention to strengthening the muscles of the back and neck. In addition, you need to review your diet. Muscle pains in athletes can be the result of improper nutrition, which means that it is necessary to coordinate your diet with a coach and a nutritionist.
