Have any of you ever found an ice pack that lasts longer than 15-20 minutes?
I need to ice my smashed-up knees and wrists. I have the standard blue (or orange) gel packs; while these work well for a short time, I would love to find something that maintains cold longer. Ideally a couple of hours, but I'd settle for anything longer than 15-20 minutes.
Does such a holy grail exist? And if so, where to find it?
I've seen a few on Amazon that claim to last several hours - but reviews say otherwise. I'd be grateful for real-life experiences and recommendations for products that really do work.
Hospitals tend to use a pad that connects to a chilled reservoir, such that the patient can refresh the cold water periodically. My Google mojo is apparently weak at the moment, as I can't find the simple gravity-free devices I've experienced, but there's a few electrically-cooled or pumped gadgets around.
Put your ice bag/gel pack into a plastic bag/ziplock, leaving air in. Apply moderate pressure on top to force air spread evenly, even in the crevasses of the gel pack close to your 'ouch' area. This air bubble will cool down, transfer the cold, but will keep your gel pack cold for longer. Use a thinner cloth between this contraption and the skin. This is a theory, btw, I'd love to get your feedback. See if theory works...
I’ve got a 500g pack of frozen peas in my freezer just for that reason. I find them much better than ice packs as they adapt much better to the body part you need iced.
Things is they need to suck a certain amount of heat out of your body to be functional, so if you buy packs that stay cold for longer and thus warm up slower they are less effective.
Buying several and start to rotate is the best solution imho.
As shopping for frozen peas was out of the question on Sunday, I had to make do with a bag of frozen blueberries that happend to be on hand. Lasted about 35 minutes, probably not as long as peas due to water content and consistency, but better than the gel packs.
Sorry couldn‘t respond earlier. But, should you need icing again, an ice bag like this, along with the neoprene holder works at least an hour and is easily refilled if you have ice on hand.
There are different cuffs - shoulder, elbow, knee. I froze block of ice (about 1 liter) and put it in the canister, filled it with water and this is good to go for a couple of hours.
I probably spent a couple months icing one or the other knee last year. It‘s great relief for pain and swelling if done consistently.
Oooooh - I've been looking for one of those for ages!
Had a similar ice bag decades ago (without the neoprene, it probably hadn't been invented yet) that I relied on to deal with migraine pain, it unfortunately got lost in one of our moves. Been searching for it's replacement ever since. Ice in one of these bags outperforms gel packs hands down.
Aye, there's the rub.
OH is now using this accident to lobby for a fridge with an ice maker when we remodel the kitchen. I've been holding out for more counter space instead, but given that I have a few weeks of icing ahead I might soon find myself coming round to his way of thinking...
Since we don‘t own and aren‘t handy, and i Love ice I bought an ice maker. Like this. If you have super hard water, filter it via a Brita or something and you won‘t have to clean it so often. Chf 150 vs chf ??,???
In most cases of joint injury the inflammation will actually inhibit healing, so anti-inflammatories are nearly always advised as a first-line treatment. There's no downside (except for possible gastric issues with heavy prolonged use in some people, easily avoided by taking PPIs, e.g Omeprazol).
One could argue that inflammation protects against further injury by disabling the joint, but that's more of an evolutionary throwback than anything else. Certainly immobilising a damaged joint is the very first thing you should do, following the RICE protocol, but reducing the inflammation is a_good_thing, so NSAIDs are nearly always recommended.
This is the advice I was given recently, too, when I tweaked my wrist. It was a query fracture but turned out to be just soft tissue damage. The hospital started me straight away on anti-inflammatories (which also helped with the pain), immobilised it, but only for a few days, and recommended cool packs. These days they are recommending that they shouldn't be "freezer cold" but fridge cold.
It's pretty out-dated these days to "let the body feel the pain and use the inflammation".