You probably don’t know that coughing can pull muscles. Coughing puts immense strain on muscles of the body, and depending on the intensity of the coughing, it could induce severe pressure on body muscles. Muscle pulling is likely to occur if the cough is persistent, hacking, or uncontrolled. Muscle strain arising from coughing mainly occurs in chest muscles though it can extend to abdominal muscles. Your back muscle may also be pulled by coughing. If the cough is severe, the straining can be intense sometimes leading in minor tears of the muscle fibers. You need to know how you can manage the condition and allow the strained muscle to heal fast. Some activities you do can worsen symptoms like pain and inflammation, so you need to know what to do and what to avoid during the recovery period. With proper care, you can be able to recover from the strain and get back to normal activities.
Symptoms Accompanying Pulled Muscles from Coughing
You may find that when you have pulled your muscle while coughing, you will have pain at the area where the pulling occurred. The pain may vary depending on how severe the strain was and the kind of damage done to the muscle. If there are minor tears of the muscle fibers, you could be feeling more pain. Flexing the muscles in the affected area may aggravate the pain.
The area of injury may become swollen, tender to touch, and stiff. You may also experience difficulties in breathing if the pulling of muscle due to coughing affects the abdominal and chest areas. The difficulty in breathing may occur when you try relaxing the muscles. The pain may worsen when you twist or bend the body.
How to Treat Pulled Muscle from Coughing
Coughs tend to be common during the cold and flu season, and at that time, some people may strain their muscles because of severe coughing causing muscles in the chest or elsewhere to become pulled. If coughing has resulted in pulled muscles, there are ways you can treat the condition. Treatment may comprise of the PRICE approach and the HARM approach.
The PRICE approach
When referring to PRICE in treating pulled muscles from coughing, it simply means that you use techniques like; protection, resting, icing, compression, and elevation.
Protection: To protect your muscle, you may want to keep the affected part from moving. People with pulled muscles caused by coughing may have aggravated pain when they try to move the muscles. The way you can reduce movement of the affected muscles is to control how you cough. You may also talk to your physician to prescribe you a cough medication or get an over-the-counter medication for coughing. This way, it will give relief to the strained muscle as it heals. When you control your cough, you rest the affected, strained, or damaged muscle. Sleeping and limiting movements also help with recovery of the muscles.
Rest: The body tends to recover when at rest. This is why after being in a workout where you strain your muscles, you are advised to take some rest to allow the body to recuperate and the muscles that may have suffered micro-tears to reconstruct or repair and recover. So, resting after a cough has caused muscle pulling is very important. You need to have bed rest and limit movements or activities like bending and twisting for some weeks.
Ice: You can apply ice on the affected part so that you reduce pain and calm down inflammation or swelling. Applying ice also soothes the muscles that have been pulled after a severe cough. When using ice, you put the cubes in a piece of clean cloth or towel and then place it on the affected area or location of pain for about 15 to 20 minutes. You can do this about 3 to 4 times a day. The reason you put the ice cubes in a cloth or towel is to prevent ice burns that occur when ice comes in direct contact with skin. Ice burns can result in blisters.
Compression wrap: You may want to use a compression wrap to reduce inflammation and swelling. If the chest muscles have been pulled, you can wrap the area, and the same applies to pulling of muscles happening elsewhere like the abdominal area. When doing the wrapping, it shouldn’t be too tight because it can result in difficult breathing. The compression wraps may be used to put the coughing under control. This way, it will ensure the pulled muscles recover quickly. Compression wraps may be in form of Ace bandage.
Elevation: You can elevate the affected muscle, it is probably the best treatment you can have for pulled muscles. However, when it comes to chest or abdominal muscles, it may not be easy to elevate them. What a patient can do is, get some pillows then prop up the chest or abdominal area so that it’s elevated. You can also lie on the other side or opposite side of the location the pulled muscle occurs.
The HARM approach
After you have experienced pulled muscles from coughing, you want to avoid harming the area. That means you avoid heat, alcohol, runs, and massage. When you do this, you prevent further injury to the muscles. Don’t use heat pads to treat the pain and don’t take hot baths. You are also not supposed to take alcohol during that time you are healing. It is paramount that you avoid vigorous movements or moving of the muscles. Refrain from massaging the muscles because it may cause more pain. After about three days, the threat of having an inflammation will have passed, and that means you can now apply heat to the area. You can also move it gingerly. It is also possible to massage the muscles, but gently.
Using Pain Relievers
In addition to taking the HARM and PRICE approach in treating the pulled muscles, you can use medicines. Over-the-counter cough syrup can help. A patient can take NSAIDs like ibuprofen or Tylenol, they help reduce pain and inflammation. Before you take any medication, consult with a doctor. Ibuprofen (Motrin and Advil) helps with both inflammation and pain, but acetaminophen (Tylenol) helps only with pain relief.
