People often see pain in their arms and legs after strenuous physical activity or exercise. If such a condition is associated with extreme stress or fatigue, the pain usually disappears after a few days. However, such anxiety is a constant concern and can appear regardless of physical activity. In this case, the pain may be due to serious health problems that require treatment.
The appearance of joint pain - arthralgia - can be observed against the background of general well-being. Painful sensations, as a rule, appear after excessive physical exertion and can be observed in pregnant women. Recently, the number of complaints of joint pain in children due to the rapid development of the musculoskeletal system has increased.
In other cases, joint pain is a sign of some pathology, a signal of an inflammatory or destructive process, an autoimmune disease. For complete healing of the joints, it is important to determine the underlying cause of the onset of pain.
General description of the problem
Pain in the legs and arms is a very common phenomenon. Such a problem is not usually related to age, and even children and adolescents often suffer from such feelings. In them, it is usually associated with rapid growth or increased physical strength. In adults, regular pain in the limbs can be caused by various diseases.
Such pains can come from any part of the environment. Often, the legs ache because they are under the greatest stress. Knee, leg and hip joints can also be affected. Pain in the hands is mainly localized in the forearm and shoulder. But often such feelings occur in the hands, preventing a person from doing normal work.
May damage bones, joints, muscles. Often the problem is due to impaired blood circulation and tissue nutrition. Sometimes anxiety is transmitted from other parts of the body through nerve fibers. Such radiation pains can be seen in diseases of the spine, myocardial infarction, kidney or biliary colic. In this case, the pain appears on the right or left, depending on which organ is affected.
Such pain is usually mild, and people describe it as a feeling of pain, anxiety. Pain can occur only during movement and is reduced at rest or constantly disturbs the person.
Caution: If the pain is not related to physical activity or is accompanied by additional symptoms, you should consult a doctor.
Without treatment, this type of pain can become chronic and lead to decreased performance or even disability. It is especially important to see a doctor if joint pain occurs at the same time as other symptoms. It can be fever, weakness, chills, nausea. This condition usually occurs with serious pathologies that require immediate treatment.
Reasons
The most common cause of excruciating pain in the limbs is ordinary fatigue. They often appear the next day after a workout. However, this can happen after working in the country, carrying heavy loads, general cleaning, or working outdoors. This usually happens to people who are not physically fit.
Such pain is called crepitus. They are simply invisible. Pain is often the result of microtrauma to muscle fibers. If this happens often, they do not have time to heal and inflammation appears. As a result, the blood supply to the tissues may be disrupted, ischemia develops. Intense exercise can also cause sprains and strains in muscles or ligaments. All of these factors cause pain that usually lasts 3-5 days. However, the accumulation of lactic acid in the muscles is not the cause of such prolonged pain, it disappears within a few hours.
But there are more serious reasons for this problem. There are several groups of pathologies that can cause pain in the legs and arms. They differ in the mechanism of formation and localization. But they have one thing in common: one of the manifestations is pain in the limbs.
What diseases can cause this symptom:
- pathology of blood vessels and arteries, usually of the lower extremities;
- infectious diseases;
- poisoning and other conditions that cause intoxication of the body;
- inflammatory pathologies of joints, muscles, nerve tissues;
- degenerative diseases of the joints and bones;
- autoimmune pathologies;
- hormonal disorders;
- tumors.
Circulatory disorders
Diseases of the blood vessels and arteries are very common. They occur in men and women of all ages. Often there are varicose veins. At the same time, the legs ache, heaviness is felt, convulsions may appear. Gradually dilated veins are visible through the skin. Thrombophlebitis and thrombosis are also common with age, and symptoms may include severe throbbing pain in one leg or arm. Atherosclerosis of the blood vessels can also cause them to become blocked, which is aggravated by movement, mainly by pressing or squeezing, which causes painful sensations.
Less common vascular pathologies include:
- obliterating endoarteritis;
- embolism of the main arteries;
- Raynaud's disease;
- arteriovenous dysplasia.
In the case of circulatory disorders, in addition to pain in the arms and legs, numbness, tingling sensation, cold limbs are often seen. Muscles weaken, fingers swell, it becomes difficult to move, things fall out of hand. If the small blood vessels of the extremities are affected, blue or purple spots may appear on the skin, and the nails become blue.
Caution: pain in the left arm is especially dangerous if it is accompanied by shortness of breath, weakness, a feeling of heaviness in the chest. This may be a sign of a myocardial infarction.
Pathologies associated with circulatory disorders include long-term immobilization. And it's not just compulsive immobility after an injury. Sitting in one position for a long time, for example, during a trip or sedentary work, can disrupt blood circulation.
Infections
Hands and feet often suffer from viral diseases. Such feelings are considered a classic symptom of the flu. They are associated with the formation of special substances in the body to fight infection - prostaglandins. They cause an increase in temperature and pain. In addition, such pain may be associated with intoxication and fever, which are accompanied by infectious diseases.
The most common pain in the limbs occurs with influenza, SARS, bronchitis, pneumonia, pyelonephritis, rubella, chickenpox. Such feelings can be a sign of borreliosis, botulism, paratyphoid, salmonellosis, cholera and many parasitic diseases.
Intoxication
Intoxication often causes pain in the muscles of the arms and legs. This is due to cell death that occurs when toxins or poisons enter the body, such as large amounts of alcohol or overdoses of certain medications. This often happens with food poisoning. Pain in the limbs is accompanied by nausea, abdominal pain and intestinal discomfort.
Intoxication also occurs with the bites of ticks, some other insects and snakes. In this case, convulsions, allergic reactions and respiratory failure may occur. And ticks often carry infectious diseases, the first manifestation of which is pain in the limbs.
Joint pathologies
After the age of 45, people often feel pain in the joints of the hands and feet. Human limbs are constantly in motion, so the joints wear out. With age, metabolic processes slow down, which adversely affects the condition of articular cartilage and other tissues. Therefore, pathologies such as arthritis, osteoarthritis, gout are common. They can affect any joint in the limbs. With osteochondrosis or spondyloarthritis, in addition to the spine, the arms or legs can also be damaged.
With all these diseases, the joints of the arms and legs ache, and the pain can spread to the muscles and other surrounding tissues. For example, osteoarthritis mainly affects the large joints. But the pain can be felt in the bones and muscles next to them. Rheumatoid arthritis usually affects the joints of the fingers. In this case, the pain is not just force. It is even felt at rest and can spread to the palms, wrists, and ankles.
Bone pathologies
Some diseases affect the bones of the arms and legs. In this case, a person experiences painful feelings that prevent him from leading a normal life. It occurs with osteomyelitis, osteomalacia or osteoporosis. These pathologies are associated with infection entering the bone tissue or lack of calcium.
Muscle aches
This is the most common cause of these feelings. Muscle pain can be seen with overwork, after injuries, with myositis. Under the influence of unfavorable external factors, the muscles become inflamed, and sometimes ischemia occurs due to circulatory disorders. In this case, the so-called "trigger points", ie areas of increasing pain appear. The pain can be dull, weak or sharp, unbearable. It can be localized in one place or spread to all organs. Muscle weakness often occurs.
This condition is called myofascial pain syndrome. This can occur after increased physical exertion, with the right leg or arm usually having more severe pain. Wearing uncomfortable shoes can lead to long-term immobilization after skeletal abnormalities, scoliosis, injuries, or illness. In addition, this situation often accompanies some professionals. For example, the right hand of office workers, tailors, hairdressers hurts.
If the muscle pain is due to hypothermia or infection, it is myositis. The pathology is accompanied by severe pain. In this case, the temperature may rise, the limb swells. Polymyositis is accompanied by painful weakness and increased fatigue.
Other diseases
Similar painful feelings can be a sign of many other pathologies. Weakness and pain in the limbs often occur with increased blood pressure, sleep disturbances, and vegetative-vascular dystonia. The cause of pain can be blood diseases, endocrine pathologies, the growth of malignant tumors.
Often such pain is caused by damage to nerve tissue. It can be neuroma, neuralgia or neuritis. Pain in the back of the thigh can be caused by sciatica, and the wrist is often affected by the carpal tunnel.
fibromyalgia
If the doctor cannot find the cause of the pain after the examination and it lasts for several months, the patient may be diagnosed with fibromyalgia. This pathology is very common, but so far scientists have not been able to determine its cause. It is also difficult to diagnose the disease, because neither tests nor hardware diagnostics can detect it. Only general symptoms allow us to talk about the spread of pathology.
Fibromyalgia is most common in women. It is believed that this is due to the reduction of pain. The source of the problem is in the brain. Often, after severe stress, a person sees pain in his arms or legs. This usually happens the next morning.
The discomfort is mainly localized in the shoulder girdle, elbows, hips or knees. In addition to pain in muscles, ligaments and tendons, the patient experiences weakness, decreased performance, increased fatigue, and deterioration of mood and memory. Often suffers from insomnia, depression, inability to relax, suffers from headaches.
Features of treatment
If the muscles start to ache after physical exertion, you can alleviate the situation yourself. To do this, it is recommended to take a relaxing bath and relax. After minor injuries, it is recommended to apply a cold compress to the affected area. It is advisable to avoid stress for a few days and the pain will soon disappear.
But all this does not help, the pain lasts for several weeks and the patient does not know what to do to get rid of the discomfort. It is best to see a doctor and get tested. After all, only when it is clear why the limbs hurt, it will be possible to choose the right treatment.
Important: Some people with these problems start taking analgesics or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. However, they do not always help, as they cause many side effects.
After the examination, only a doctor can determine how to treat the pathology. It depends on what is causing the pain, where it is localized, and their intensity.
Analgesics or NSAIDs are usually used for treatment. For severe pain, your doctor may prescribe anesthetic injections at the site of the pain projection or injections of corticosteroids.
In addition to these drugs and in mild cases, external agents are used independently. These can be NSAIDs, capsaicin, bee venom, ointments or gels based on essential oils. They have analgesic, warming and distracting effects, helping to relieve muscle spasms and improve blood circulation.
The complex treatment of such pathologies includes other means. Their choice depends on the cause of the pain. For example, in the case of joint pathologies, chondroprotectors are prescribed to restore cartilage tissue. Antidepressants help with fibromyalgia.
Muscle relaxants are often used to relieve muscle spasms that can increase or cause pain. Multivitamins, especially those with B vitamins, are needed to restore blood circulation and nerve conduction. Drugs that improve peripheral circulation and accelerate tissue regeneration are also effective.
Often, such pains reduce the mobility of the limbs, weaken the muscles, and lose the elasticity of the joints. Massage and physiotherapy exercises are used to restore the function of the arms and legs. They help to restore normal muscle tone and improve joint mobility. Strengthening the muscle corset allows you to avoid such problems in the future.
results
Pain in the arms and legs is rarely a serious pathology, and often occurs with overwork. However, such pain, if left untreated, can indicate the development of some diseases that can lead to complications. Therefore, do not ignore the pain that lasts more than a week. It is best to consult a doctor who will help determine the cause and prescribe treatment.