Heat and cold therapy is warmth or cold applied to the injured area, from hot packs, ice packs or a heated infrared table, to settle pain and get the tissue ready for the rest of your visit. It is usually the first stop of a physiotherapy visit at Gateway Midwest.
You get this treatment only if your physician orders it, and your physician also sets how strong it is.
What is heat and cold therapy?
It is the simplest tool in the program: warmth or cold on the sore spot, with a towel between the pack and your skin. Your physician’s order says which one, where, and for how long.
How does it help after a crash or fall?
Cold is used on brand-new injuries and on flare-ups, because it holds down swelling and numbs pain. Heat relaxes tight, guarded muscles and brings blood into the area, so the stretching and treatments that come next work better. The choice belongs to your physician, not to a guess made at the station.
What does it feel like?
Heat is meant to feel cozy, and it should never feel hot. Cold starts cool and turns a bit numb. There is a towel layer between your skin and the pack every time, and five minutes in, your technician peeks under it to check your skin.
Who should not have it?
- Areas where the skin has lost feeling
- Heat on a swollen or bruised injury from the past 3 days (cold is used instead)
- Cold if you have Raynaud’s, hives set off by cold, or poor circulation in that area
- Open wounds, rashes or burns
- Heat on the stomach or lower back during a pregnancy
- A fever or an infection
Each session opens with your technician reading the safety questions aloud to you. A changed answer sends the decision to a physician before the machine is turned on. Saying stop ends the treatment, any time.
How long does it take?
Plan on 10 to 15 minutes.
What to remember
- Fresh injury or flare-up: cold. Stiff and tight: heat.
- Warm is right. Hot is wrong, so speak up.
- Skin and pack never touch; a towel sits between them.
Show us you have it: In your own words, lay out your heat-or-cold plan for home, the number of minutes, and the cloth that keeps the pack off your skin. If any part is unclear, ask us to go over it again; there is no limit on that.
Many crash injuries barely hurt on day one. If your soreness showed up a day or two later, read about delayed symptoms after a crash.
Other treatments in the program
- Vibration therapy
- Traction chair
- Neck decompression
- Laser therapy
- Shockwave therapy
- TENS (gentle electrical stimulation)
This page belongs to the Gateway Midwest physician-directed physiotherapy program. On Natural Bridge Road, the physician who examined you signs each order, and no treatment runs without a physician on site.
Hurt in an accident? Start here.
You do not need a lawyer, a police report or a referral to be seen. Bring your symptoms and we will work out the rest.
Monday–Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. Same-day appointments are often available for new accident and injury patients.