How to Take Care of your Leg Muscle Strain

Our legs help us go through a lot every day. Through our daily activities, we put a lot of strain on them. Thus, when they get really exerted, a muscle pull or strain can set them back a little. A muscle pull refers to a damage or tear to any muscle or their surrounding tendons. Undue pressure due to our normal activities, any athletic move or sudden heavy lifting can cause a muscle strain. 

When a muscle pull or strain happens, it can tear the affected muscle partially or fully. It also affects the surrounding blood vessels and tendons, causing local bruising and bleeding. It also affects the surrounding nerve endings, thus causing moderate to immense pain in the affected area. 

There are some tell-tale symptoms of a muscle strain. Other than the pain that is there in the affected area even at rest, there may be swelling, bruising around the skin, internal local bleeding, redness and itchiness due to the injury. Sometimes the strain may be only at a local muscle so a sharp pain can be felt only when that muscle is moved. The muscles become weak and using your legs in general for even mild activities like walking can become difficult. While the pain is there, it might be that the strain is so severe, that the muscle becomes completely immovable.

In case of severe pain or if home remedies do not show any signs of recovery in the first 24 hours of spraining, consult your physician and seek medical help.  

Most often, muscle strains are not so severe and can be treated at home with proper care and guidance. To stop the bleeding and bruising, it’s best to use an ice pack as soon as you injure yourself. However, always remember to use a towel or any other protective layer between your skin and the ice. Stretch out the affected limb for optimum leg pain relief. You can have a non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory medicine but if you are on other medications and face any other disorder, make sure you take proper medical guidance before having it. 

Rest your strained muscle as much as possible and avoid exerting any weight on it. Try not to do any physical exercise for the next one week after straining your muscle.  

Keep applying the ice pack on the affected area every 15 to 20 minutes to reduce the swelling. It is really effective as an anti-inflammatory and stops the blood flow to the affected area to decrease the swelling. 

Make sure you compress the pulled muscle area on your leg with a Hansaplast Crepe Bandage. Choose the right sized one out of the four offerings Hansaplast has and wrap it tightly around your leg to relieve yourself of the muscle pain. However, make sure you don’t wrap it too tightly as it may restrict blood flow and cause more damage. If it causes numbness, redness or itchiness on the swelling, loosen the bandage around your leg and let it relax for a while. 

Lastly, make sure you keep your leg at an elevated level when you’re relaxing, sitting or sleeping. This will relax your muscle and release any fluid build-up that has been happening in the strained area. 

Muscle pulls can be a huge setback to your daily routine. You need to monitor it carefully, take adequate rest and not stress yourself at all to heal fast, recover and get back on track. Till your muscle shows significant signs of recovery, do not exert it much. However, after that, do some light stretches now and then to ease your muscle into activity slowly, readying it for your active lifestyle again.