Heat treatment For Neck Pain

Heat Therapy For Neck Pain

Warm Buddy heat wraps and heat packs offer a simple means to relieving neck and should pain using their warm moist penetrating heat, all their heat wraps can be used hot or cold depending on the therapy required.
Warm Buddy heat wraps offer a warm moist heat that will penetrate into the muscle tissue fast so to relieve aches and pains fast and naturally. Heat increases the blood flow to the muscles thus aiding in a faster recovery time..

Heat Therapy For Neck Pain

What heat is for

Heat is primarily for muscle pain, and for stress relief. Warm Buddy heat packs and heat wraps offer a warm moist penetrating heat, that penetrate the muscle tissue and relieve aches and pains fast  and without the need of any over the counter pain medication.

Heat packs and heat therapy

Heat Packs Therapy

What is heat therapy used for?

Heat packs can reduce muscle spasms, reduce joint stiffness, and make soft tissue more limber. Heat can be used to help loosen tight muscles and joints during a warm-up period before exercise. For example, you may put moist heat packs on tight leg muscles before running, or on your shoulder before throwing, or on tight neck or back muscles.

Sports Therapy wrap heat pack

When should I use heat?

Use heat packs for stiff muscles and joints when you are trying to make them more limber. Do not use heat in the first few days after an injury or while your injury has any swelling because heat increases blood flow and can worsen swelling.

How should I use heat?

Moist heat is more effective than dry heat because it penetrates more deeply, which increases the effect on muscles, joints, and soft tissue. Use it for 15 to 20 minutes or longer if recommended by your health care provider.

Cancer - skin stimulation - Heat therapy

Cancer - skin stimulation:

Skin stimulation

In this series of techniques, pressure, warmth, or cold is used on the skin, while the feeling of pain is lessened or blocked. Massage, pressure, vibration, heat, cold, and menthol preparations can also be used to stimulate the skin. These techniques also change the flow of blood to the area that is stimulated. Sometimes skin stimulation will get rid of pain or lessen pain during the stimulation and for hours after it is finished.

Body wrap for heat therapy

Skin stimulation is done either on or near the area of pain. You can also use skin stimulation on the side of the body opposite the pain. For example, you might stimulate the left knee to decrease the pain in the right knee. Stimulating the skin in areas away from the pain can be used to increase relaxation and may relieve pain.

We have many customers who have gone through chemotherapy and have found our heat packs to be of great relief for their after pain, all our heat packs can be used hot or cold depending on the type of therapy required.

Warm Buddy make the best heat packs for relieving pain and stress

Warm Buddy Company creates products that promote relaxation and provide natural relief from aches, pains and stress. We have been following this philosophy since 1995, while creating our world famous aromatherapy heat wraps, heat packs, eye pillows and the original warm up plush animals.

Warm Buddy rejuvenating heat therapy products have become recognized for their superior quality and long heat holding ability. Warm Buddy heat wraps and heat packs are safe, easy to use and highly effective. Simply heat in the microwave or cool in the freezer as desired.

All Warm Buddy heat therapy products are Approved medical devices by Health Canada for the relief of aches pains and stress.

All Warm Buddy heat therapy products are proudly made in Canada.

Heat packs for fast back pain relief

Heat packs

Back pain relief starts in just 3 minutes, that is how long it takes to warm the Sports Therapy Wrap .
Muscle pain management with the Sports Therapy wrap uses warm moist penetrating heat,
that relieves muscle aches and pains fast and naturally.
The heat wrap can also be used for cold therapy, pop it in the freezer for a couple of hours and it is ready to relieve fresh muscle injuries, I always have 2 heat wraps one that is always in the freezer and the other to pop in the microwave.

Fast back pain relief - Heat pack

What heat is for

Heat is primarily for muscle pain, and for stress relief. Warm Buddy heat packs and heat wraps offer a warm moist penetrating heat, that penetrate the muscle tissue and relieve aches and pains fast  and without the need of any over the counter pain medication.
The trick is knowing what muscle pain is. Muscle causes much more pain than most people are aware of. Some kinds of muscle pain are obvious enough — like the pain you get after the first ski trip of the season, or charlie horses in the night — but these are relatively isolated and obvious examples. Also, heat isn’t especially useful for them. Charlie horses are pretty fast, and for most people a rare problem, thankfully. And that post-exercise muscle soreness is virtually immune to any kind of therapy.
But muscle knots …
When you say that you have “knots in your muscles,” you are actually talking about trigger points. A trigger point is a small patch of contracted, stagnant, swampy muscle tissue. Instead of the whole muscle being in spasm, just a little piece of it is in spasm.
If you’d like to detour and learn much more about trigger points, see
Trigger Points & Myofascial Pain Syndrome: A guide to the science of muscle pain, with reviews of every possible self-treatment and therapy option, even for the most difficult cases.
Trigger points are likely to be the most common cause of undiagnosed and unexplained aches and pains, especially stubborn or recurrent headaches, neck cricks and backaches. It is a much more common cause of pain than the more widely reported repetitive strain injuries (RSIs), nerve pain, or herniated disks. Trigger points also complicate essentially all other injuries: they usually appear in response to other kinds of pain and dysfunction, and then often begin to overshadow the original problem.
And heat is a good therapy for trigger points.

What heat is not for

Never apply heat to a fresh injury! Really. Just don’t do it! That’s what icing is for. Ice is for injuries.
And what’s a “fresh” injury? Any time tissue has been physically damaged, it will be inflamed for a few days, give or take, depending on the seriousness of the injury. If superficial tissue is sensitive to touch, if the skin is hot and red, if there is swelling, these are all signs that your injury is still fresh, and should not be heated.
Here’s an example of what can happen when you heat an inflamed injury: When I was still in school, and my father had not yet learned to call me before asking a doctor about his aches and pains, he went to a drop-in clinic following a traumatic knee injury. The physician on duty prescribed heat! This is shockingly wrong, but the results spoke loud and clear: his knee swelled dramatically, outrageously, causing severe pain and immobility.
Bear in mind that heating is for muscle knots or trigger points and muscle spasm, but not for physically injured muscle — muscle strains, pulled muscles, torn muscles. Damaged muscle is usually inflamed, not in spasm, and trigger points are a minor factor in the aftermath of the injury. It’s usually obvious that you’ve torn muscle because there is always a very clear, nasty “oh shit” moment of trauma, where you know — instantly — that something has gone quite wrong.
However, you may be understandably confused about the difference between spasms, knots, tears, etc., especially if you have back pain, where it can and does sometimes get all mixed together. People routinely believe that their backs and necks are injured when in fact they are just suffering from trigger points. I have other articles devoted to clearing up this confusion.
If you think you have a muscle strain, but you’re not sure, a great article for helping you sort it out is Save Yourself from Muscle Strain!
If back pain is your issue and your not sure what’s causing it, get thee to Save Yourself from Low Back Pain!
And the article (Almost) Never Use Ice on Low Back Pain! is specifically devoted to helping people understand why heating back pain is almost always better than icing it.

How heat works

It’s not scientifically clear exactly why heat is such a treat. However, a good guess is that there are several minor positive effects that add up to … therapy. Most of these effects are also beneficial in other ways. Not incredibly beneficial, and not even notably different from icing: for instance, a 2010 study showed quite clearly that both ice packs and hot packs were beneficial for neck and back pain, and about equally so.1 But a small therapeutic effect is still valuable even if it’s small, and there are probably situations where it works even better — after all, these were people with acute pain bad enough that they went to the hospital. They may have been a bit beyond the help of a hot pack!
Trigger points are known to be aggravated by stress (“fight or flight” hormones and neurology). As long as we aren’t overheated to begin with, being warm is a pleasant and comforting sensation. Our comfort zone is a warm place. Heat almost always relaxes you overall.
Overall relaxation usually reduces resting muscle tone. You can have “tight” muscles without actually being in spasm. There are many degrees of increasing muscle tone between relaxed and “spasm.” A true muscle spasm is very strong and painful, like a charlie horse. But many people live in a state of near spasm — their muscles always clenched and exhausted. This state is both uncomfortable in itself, causing the same kind of muscle discomfort that you have when you are exhausted from exercise … but without the endorphins. And of course it also aggravates trigger points. So any reduction in muscle tone is quite helpful. And the reduction in stress hormones makes it a more therapeutic (lasting) effect, as opposed to just momentary symptom relief.
Our comfort zone is a warm place. Heat almost always relaxes you overall.
Although scientists don’t really understand the physiology of why trigger points come and go, they have certainly identified why they hurt — the stagnant, swampy tissue fluids inside a trigger point are a disgusting bath for nerve endings. Heat facilitates circulation somewhat, helping to wash away metabolic waste products, and bring fresh oxygen and nutrients to the area. No one knows how strong this effect is.
As with everything about trigger points, there are many (many) variables, and consequently it is very hard to study, and everyone gets different results. But heat seems to have enough relevant benefits that many people get at least temporary, partial relief from trigger point pain by heating. And some people find it downright curative.

Warm Buddy - Stress Relief - Heat Wrap

 Warm Buddy Shoulder wrap for fast stress relief

The best Neck & shoulder pain heated neck wrap, also used for stress and tension relief.
Neck pain & stress relief heat wrap - Warm moist penetrating heat. Can be used hot or cold
People who suffer from shoulder pain rely on our shoulder wrap to ease these aches and pains naturally.

Stress relief shoulder wrap

Stress has a physical effect on the body. When you suffer from anxiety, you're putting your body through extensive, long term stress. Your body is in fight or flight mode, and that means that it's releasing hormones that tense muscles and create an overall feeling of general unpleasantness that, in many ways, contributes to further anxiety.
Neck pain is one of the symptoms caused by persistent anxiety. It doesn't occur with everyone – very few anxiety symptoms occur in everyone – but many do experience a degree of neck pain that ranges anywhere from slightly irritating to severe, all as a result of their anxiety symptoms.

Neck Pain = Anxiety?

Neck pain is a very real, very common anxiety symptom. Unfortunately, some people experience such a degree of neck pain stiffness that they actually become more anxious, and increase their neck pain experience.
The good news is that you can cure your neck pain forever. Don't just manage it. Get rid of it.

Warm Buddy and Autistic children

Autism and Autistic kids

Here is a comment from a school with Autistic and special needs children and how they are benefiting
from having Warm Buddies:
"We have started using Warm Buddies on our transitional care unit with our children who as a result
of neurological trauma have difficulty staying warm on their own.
The Warm Buddies are personalized

Large Warm up puppy

for each child with their own “collar”. It is important that our kids feel like they are in a home like
environment vs an impersonal medical setting. The Warm Buddies look and feel as if they are cuddling
up with their favorite stuffed animal however we know it is so much more than that, they are a modality
that is helping our kids stay happy and healthy". Childserve USA

ChildServe USA

Warm Buddy - Arthritis relief

Arthritis and heat relief

Arthritis and Heat or Cold relief

People that suffer from arthritis tend to not only have pain but stiffness in the joints as well. This can be extremely uncomfortable but there are various different ways that the pain of arthritis can be eased. One of the best ways to treat arthritis pain is with the various hot and cold therapies available on the market as these treatments do not require an inconvenient trip to the doctor but can instead be bought online and self-administered according to the manufacturer's guidelines. Hot and cold therapies work for a lot of people and are often chosen by those people who are looking for pain relief that is easy to get hold of and convenient to use at that moment when the pain starts to creep in.
As with a lot of pain relief methods, hot and cold therapies are not guaranteed to work for everyone, but those who suffer from arthritis will know that any safe and fully tested method of pain relief is worth a try. There are different ways to administer hot and cold treatments and the best way to choose the right one for you is simply by trying what is on offer and finding the one that works best for you and your symptoms.
As well as being extremely convenient and easy to use, hot and cold treatments can really help to prevent the onset of pain if you use it at those times of the day or year (for example at night or when it is particularly cold) when your symptoms seem to worsen. Generally speaking, if a person has to suffer without any kind of pain relief, it will take them longer to heal because their body is tense and instead of getting essential bed rest, the sufferer finds it difficult to sleep at all.
Heated pain relief can help to improve blood circulation, which in turn means increased oxygen and white blood cells to the painful areas. There are different ways to apply heat to areas of your body that suffer from arthritis, from Warm Buddy  moist heat packs and wheat bags, to wax baths and cherry stone packs and both moist and dry heat can work really well to ease muscle and joint pain.
Cold pain relief works better for some and as well as helping to reduce the pain, it can also work to reduce swelling and inflammations. Cold pain relief includes methods such as applying Warm Buddy heat packs (place heat pack in freezer for a couple of hours) to the affected area. Cold therapy methods tend to work best for temporary pain relief and reducing inflammation, while hot therapies tend to work well when treating pain that lasts longer than 48 hours.

Wildflowers Aromatherapy and Gifts

Warm Buddy Heat Packs - Heat Wraps and Warm up animals

Warm Buddy products

Warm Buddy heat packs and warm up animals are all approved medical devices for the relief of muscle pain stress and comfort.

Heat Packs and heat wraps

 Heat packs and heat wraps

Warm Buddy Company creates products that promote relaxation and provide natural relief from aches, pains and stress. We have been following this philosophy since 1995, while creating our world famous aromatherapy heat wraps, heat packs, eye pillows and the original warm up plush animals.

Warm Buddy rejuvenating heat therapy products have become recognized for their superior quality and long heat holding ability. Warm Buddy heat wraps and heat packs are safe, easy to use and highly effective. Simply heat in the microwave or cool in the freezer as desired.

All Warm Buddy heat therapy products are proudly made in Canada. 

Warm up animals

The Warm Buddy Company created the original warm-up plush stuffed animals. Each of our Warm Buddies comes with a removable inner pack that can be heated in the microwave or cooled in the freezer. These inner packs contain all natural ingredients and provide natural relief from aches, pains and stress.

Warm buddies help comfort children and adults to sleep at night. Our Warm Buddy family includes: Beary Bear, Wooly the Sheep, Puppies, Pandas, Penguins, Moosey and Froggie. The perfect gift for ages 3-100. Warm Buddy warm-up plush animals are proudly made in Canada with imported covers.

Large warm up puppy

Our warm-up plush animals have been awarded the prestigious PTPA (Parent Tested Parent Approved) Seal of Approval for excellence in parenting products. Warm Buddies won the award based on exceptional "value, functionality, quality and appeal of the product." To read more about the PTPA award visit our in the news section.

The Warm Buddy Company is proud to donate a portion of sales from our Bear Mitts, Small Beary, Large Beary and Pandas to allow Bears Matter (a non-profit organization) to help bears in need around the world. For more information or to get involved please visit bearsmatter.com

Benefits of Heat Therapy for Back Pain relief

The Benefits of Heat Therapy for Back Pain

The over­all qual­i­ties of warmth and heat have long been asso­ci­ated with com­fort and relax­ation,
Warm Buddy heat ther­apy goes a step fur­ther and can pro­vide both pain relief and heal­ing ben­e­fits for many types of back pain. In addi­tion, heat ther­apy for back pain is both inex­pen­sive and easy to do.

How heat ther­apy works

Many episodes of lower back pain result from strains and over-exertions, cre­at­ing ten­sion in the mus­cles and soft tis­sues around the lower spine. As a result, this restricts proper cir­cu­la­tion and sends pain sig­nals to the brain.
Mus­cle spasm in the lower back can cre­ate sen­sa­tions that may range from mild dis­com­fort to excru­ci­at­ing lower back pain. Heat ther­apy can help relieve pain from the mus­cle spasm and related tight­ness in the lower back.
Heat ther­apy appli­ca­tion can help pro­vide back pain relief through sev­eral mechanisms:

* Heat ther­apy dilates the blood ves­sels of the mus­cles sur­round­ing the lum­bar spine. This process increases the flow of oxy­gen and nutri­ents to the mus­cles, help­ing to heal the dam­aged tis­sue.
* Heat stim­u­lates the sen­sory recep­tors in the skin, which means that apply­ing heat to the lower back will decrease trans­mis­sions of pain sig­nals to the brain and par­tially relieve the dis­com­fort.
* Heat appli­ca­tion facil­i­tates stretch­ing the soft tis­sues around the spine, includ­ing mus­cles, con­nec­tive tis­sue, and adhe­sion. Con­se­quently, with heat ther­apy, there will be a decrease in stiff­ness as well as injury, with an increase in flex­i­bil­ity and over­all feel­ing of com­fort. Flex­i­bil­ity is very impor­tant for a healthy back.
There are sev­eral other sig­nif­i­cant ben­e­fits of heat ther­apy that make it so appeal­ing. Com­pared to most ther­a­pies, heat ther­apy is quite inex­pen­sive. Heat ther­apy is also easy to do — it can be done at home while relax­ing, and also make it an option while at work or in the car.
For many peo­ple, heat ther­apy works best when com­bined with other treat­ment modal­i­ties, such as phys­i­cal ther­apy and exer­cise. Rel­a­tive to most med­ical treat­ments avail­able, heat ther­apy is appeal­ing to many peo­ple because it is a non-invasive and non-pharmaceutical form of back pain relief

How to Apply Heat Therapy

The most effec­tive heat ther­apy prod­uct is one of our Warm Buddy heat packs or wraps . They can main­tain their heat at the proper tem­per­a­ture. “Warm” is the proper tem­per­a­ture. Patients should not have their heat source be hot to the point of burn­ing the skin. The desired effect is for the heat to pen­e­trate down into the mus­cles. Sim­ply increas­ing the tem­per­a­ture of the skin will do lit­tle to decrease discomfort.

In many instances, the longer the heat is applied, the bet­ter. The dura­tion that one needs to apply the heat, though, is based on the type of and/or mag­ni­tude of the injury. For very minor back ten­sion, short amounts of heat ther­apy may be suf­fi­cient (such as 15 to 20 min­utes). For more intense injuries, longer ses­sions of heat may be more ben­e­fi­cial (such as 30 min­utes to 2 hours, or more).
A foot note our heat packs can be used for hot or cold therapy depending on the injury

How to find a job that you like

How to find a job that you like (Love)

Over the years I have used a very simple formula to finding the job I would love to have, these principles have also been used by my daughter and many friends who have all found the job they love.

• Don’t look in the job vacancies.

         •Why, because everyone else is looking for that job

• Do some research on the perfect company YOU would like to work the rest of your working life with.

• Research this companies mission statement, take key words and phrases from this statement.

• Compose an introductory letter to the CEO or top person in the company, using the key words, or phrases from their mission statement, all the time making yourself irresistible to them, explaining why you would like to work for them and the skill sets that would make you an excellent fit.

             • Why the top person, everything flows down from the      top and if you are that irresistible this person is going to instruct their HR person to look at you. The HR is not going to say no to the boss.

• Again if you have made yourself that irresistible they are not going to let any of their competitors snap you up and they will search for a position for you.

• Your chances are that much greater  as there is NO competition as there was NO job offered on the market, you have created the need and the position.

This has worked for me throughout my working career and my daughter has found her lifetime career this way.

Good luck

How to keep cool this summer with a Warm Buddy

 Keeping cool this summer

Summer is nearly here and each year we look for ways to keep cool,without breaking the bank with expensive air conditioners.
Why not try a heat pack to keep cool...yes,a heat pack.
Warm Buddy have been making therapeutic heat packs and wraps since 1985 and one of their main features is that it can be used hot or cold.

Just pop it in the freezer for a couple of hours and it will keep you cool for an hour or so.
I always have 2 packs in the freezer so when one, warms up to room temperature I replace it in the freezer and take out the other one.
Always place the heat pack in a freezer bag to stop other smells from products in the freezer being transferred to the heat pack.
For kids and adults alike, use the heat pack insert in our warm up animals to keep cool, remove the heat pack, place it in a freezer bag and put it in the freezer for an hour or more , then replace the pack in the animal and this will help keep you cool.             
Plus you have a heat pack available to relieve any aches and pains.
Here's to a cool and pain free summer.

Back pain relief for the summer

Back pain relief Sports Therapy wrap

 

Back pain relief

Summer is here and so are the long days and yard work.
It is important to show your muscle the respect they deserve, they need to last a life time.
As athletes do, you should also do.
Athletes know how to treat their muscles they do warm ups and also pre warm ups as it is important to have your muscles warm and supple before any strenuous work or exercise.
Warm Buddy have been making heat packs and heat wraps since 1985.
They are all natural and are approved by Health Canada as a medical device to relieve aches pains and stress.
Our Sports Therapy wrap and Body wrap are 2 time tested heat wraps that use warm moist heat that will penetrate the muscle tissue and relive aches and pains and also warm muscles up prior to any hard work.

The benefits of using heat for pain relief

Using Heat for Pain Problems

When and how to apply heat for therapy … and when not to!

Published 2007, updated 2010
by Paul Ingraham, Vancouver, Canada
Not sure when to use ice or heat? Start with this super-short overview:
The Great Ice vs. Heat Confusion Debacle.
Please note that you should rarely (almost never) ice low back pain.
Therapeutic heating — “thermotherapy” for therapy geeks — is more useful than most people realize, because painful muscle problems are more common than most people realize. Pain caused by muscle spasm and muscular trigger points (muscle knots) is common and often severe, yet routinely mistaken for other kinds of problems. Consequently, one of the cheapest and best treatments — heat! — is routinely neglected.

Mustard plasters were widely used and probably brought about relaxation of muscle spasm through the heat generated by the plaster. Sometimes folk medicine is more sensible than ‘modern’ medicine. In any case, I suspect that the low-key, nonthreatening approach to back problems characterized by an earlier time helped to prevent the kind of long-term, disastrous courses that exist today.
John Sarno, Mind Over Back Pain: A radically new approach to the diagnosis and treatment of back pain

Everyone should understand heating the same way everyone knows how to put on a band aid. It is a cheap, drugless way of helping an amazing array of pain problems related to muscle dysfunction, especially neck and back pain. Heat will not single-handedly “cure” such problems, but it is directly therapeutic, as opposed to “just” relieving symptoms.

What heat is for

Heat is primarily for muscle pain, and for stress relief. Warm Buddy heat packs and heat wraps offer a warm moist penetrating heat, that penetrate the muscle tissue and relieve aches and pains fast  and without the need of any over the counter pain medication.
The trick is knowing what muscle pain is. Muscle causes much more pain than most people are aware of. Some kinds of muscle pain are obvious enough — like the pain you get after the first ski trip of the season, or charlie horses in the night — but these are relatively isolated and obvious examples. Also, heat isn’t especially useful for them. Charlie horses are pretty fast, and for most people a rare problem, thankfully. And that post-exercise muscle soreness is virtually immune to any kind of therapy.
But muscle knots …
When you say that you have “knots in your muscles,” you are actually talking about trigger points. A trigger point is a small patch of contracted, stagnant, swampy muscle tissue. Instead of the whole muscle being in spasm, just a little piece of it is in spasm.
If you’d like to detour and learn much more about trigger points, see
Trigger Points & Myofascial Pain Syndrome: A guide to the science of muscle pain, with reviews of every possible self-treatment and therapy option, even for the most difficult cases.
Trigger points are likely to be the most common cause of undiagnosed and unexplained aches and pains, especially stubborn or recurrent headaches, neck cricks and backaches. It is a much more common cause of pain than the more widely reported repetitive strain injuries (RSIs), nerve pain, or herniated disks. Trigger points also complicate essentially all other injuries: they usually appear in response to other kinds of pain and dysfunction, and then often begin to overshadow the original problem.
And heat is a good therapy for trigger points.

What heat is not for

Never apply heat to a fresh injury! Really. Just don’t do it! That’s what icing is for. Ice is for injuries.
And what’s a “fresh” injury? Any time tissue has been physically damaged, it will be inflamed for a few days, give or take, depending on the seriousness of the injury. If superficial tissue is sensitive to touch, if the skin is hot and red, if there is swelling, these are all signs that your injury is still fresh, and should not be heated.
Here’s an example of what can happen when you heat an inflamed injury: When I was still in school, and my father had not yet learned to call me before asking a doctor about his aches and pains, he went to a drop-in clinic following a traumatic knee injury. The physician on duty prescribed heat! This is shockingly wrong, but the results spoke loud and clear: his knee swelled dramatically, outrageously, causing severe pain and immobility.
Bear in mind that heating is for muscle knots or trigger points and muscle spasm, but not for physically injured muscle — muscle strains, pulled muscles, torn muscles. Damaged muscle is usually inflamed, not in spasm, and trigger points are a minor factor in the aftermath of the injury. It’s usually obvious that you’ve torn muscle because there is always a very clear, nasty “oh shit” moment of trauma, where you know — instantly — that something has gone quite wrong.
However, you may be understandably confused about the difference between spasms, knots, tears, etc., especially if you have back pain, where it can and does sometimes get all mixed together. People routinely believe that their backs and necks are injured when in fact they are just suffering from trigger points. I have other articles devoted to clearing up this confusion.
If you think you have a muscle strain, but you’re not sure, a great article for helping you sort it out is Save Yourself from Muscle Strain!
If back pain is your issue and your not sure what’s causing it, get thee to Save Yourself from Low Back Pain!
And the article (Almost) Never Use Ice on Low Back Pain! is specifically devoted to helping people understand why heating back pain is almost always better than icing it.

How heat works

It’s not scientifically clear exactly why heat is such a treat. However, a good guess is that there are several minor positive effects that add up to … therapy. Most of these effects are also beneficial in other ways. Not incredibly beneficial, and not even notably different from icing: for instance, a 2010 study showed quite clearly that both ice packs and hot packs were beneficial for neck and back pain, and about equally so.1 But a small therapeutic effect is still valuable even if it’s small, and there are probably situations where it works even better — after all, these were people with acute pain bad enough that they went to the hospital. They may have been a bit beyond the help of a hot pack!
Trigger points are known to be aggravated by stress (“fight or flight” hormones and neurology). As long as we aren’t overheated to begin with, being warm is a pleasant and comforting sensation. Our comfort zone is a warm place. Heat almost always relaxes you overall.
Overall relaxation usually reduces resting muscle tone. You can have “tight” muscles without actually being in spasm. There are many degrees of increasing muscle tone between relaxed and “spasm.” A true muscle spasm is very strong and painful, like a charlie horse. But many people live in a state of near spasm — their muscles always clenched and exhausted. This state is both uncomfortable in itself, causing the same kind of muscle discomfort that you have when you are exhausted from exercise … but without the endorphins. And of course it also aggravates trigger points. So any reduction in muscle tone is quite helpful. And the reduction in stress hormones makes it a more therapeutic (lasting) effect, as opposed to just momentary symptom relief.
Our comfort zone is a warm place. Heat almost always relaxes you overall.
Although scientists don’t really understand the physiology of why trigger points come and go, they have certainly identified why they hurt — the stagnant, swampy tissue fluids inside a trigger point are a disgusting bath for nerve endings. Heat facilitates circulation somewhat, helping to wash away metabolic waste products, and bring fresh oxygen and nutrients to the area. No one knows how strong this effect is.
As with everything about trigger points, there are many (many) variables, and consequently it is very hard to study, and everyone gets different results. But heat seems to have enough relevant benefits that many people get at least temporary, partial relief from trigger point pain by heating. And some people find it downright curative.
 

Cancer - skin stimulation:

Skin stimulation

In this series of techniques, pressure, warmth, or cold is used on the skin, while the feeling of pain is lessened or blocked. Massage, pressure, vibration, heat, cold, and menthol preparations can also be used to stimulate the skin. These techniques also change the flow of blood to the area that is stimulated. Sometimes skin stimulation will get rid of pain or lessen pain during the stimulation and for hours after it is finished.
Skin stimulation is done either on or near the area of pain. You can also use skin stimulation on the side of the body opposite the pain. For example, you might stimulate the left knee to decrease the pain in the right knee. Stimulating the skin in areas away from the pain can be used to increase relaxation and may relieve pain.

We have many customers who have gone through chemotherapy and have found our heat packs to be of great relief for their after pain, all our heat packs can be used hot or cold depending on the type of therapy required.

Warm Buddy make the best heat packs for relieving pain and stress

Warm Buddy Company creates products that promote relaxation and provide natural relief from aches, pains and stress. We have been following this philosophy since 1995, while creating our world famous aromatherapy heat wraps, heat packs, eye pillows and the original warm up plush animals.

Warm Buddy rejuvenating heat therapy products have become recognized for their superior quality and long heat holding ability. Warm Buddy heat wraps and heat packs are safe, easy to use and highly effective. Simply heat in the microwave or cool in the freezer as desired.

All Warm Buddy heat therapy products are Approved medical devices by Health Canada for the relief of aches pains and stress.

All Warm Buddy heat therapy products are proudly made in Canada.

Heat and Pain Relief

We instinctively know that heat is good for pain relief, but do we know why? 

Scientists have found a molecular basis for the long-standing theory that heat, such as that from a hot-water bottle applied to the skin, provides relief from internal pains, such as stomach aches, for up to an hour.

Dr Brian King, leader of the team that carried out the research at the UCL Department of Physiology, said: "The heat doesn't just provide comfort and have a placebo effect - it actually deactivates the pain at a molecular level in much the same way as pharmaceutical painkillers work. We have discovered how this molecular process works."

The team found that when heat is applied to the skin near to where internal pain is felt, it switches on heat receptors located at the site of injury. These heat receptors in turn block the effect of chemical messengers that cause pain to be detected by the body.   
How does heat help?

• By increasing tissue elasticity, heat reduces your resting muscle tension and helps to relax those nasty painful knots.
  

• Your pain is quickly eased via the sedation and soothing of any pain-irritated nerve endings.
  

• The deep heating effect increases your blood flow to the painful area, bringing more nutrients to the injured area while flushing out the injured debris. This helps to quicken your healing rate.
  

The deep heat also promotes a speedier healing rate by stimulating your natural metabolic rate. In other words, there is more energy available to fix the injury quicker.