The Best Treatments for Nerve Pain and Nerve Damage
Nerve damage is also known as peripheral neuropathy. The nerves in your arms, feet, and hands are most likely to be damaged than other parts of the body. When you’re injured or have surgery, the nerves no longer get the signal from your brain to transmit sensation.
Symptoms of Nerve Pain and Nerve Damage
There are several symptoms of nerve pain and nerve damage should know, according to the type and location of the nerves that are affected:
Autonomic nerves are a group of nerves that regulates activities that are not controlled consciously, such as breathing, heart and thyroid function, and digesting food.
Symptoms of autonomic nerve damage:
- Inability to sense chest pain, such as angina or heart attack;
- Excessive sweating or too little sweating;
- Changes in blood pressure;
- Feeling dizzy;
- Dry eyes and mouth;
- Constipation or gastrointestinal problems;
- Bladder dysfunction;
- Sexual dysfunction.
- Heat intolerance
Motor nerves regulate all the muscles under your conscious control, such as those used for walking, talking and holding objects.
Symptoms of damaged motor nerves:
- Weakness;
- Muscle weakness;
- Painful cramps;
- Uncontrollable muscle twitching, also known as fasciculation;
- Paralysis.
Sensory nerves relay information about touch, temperature and pain, you may experience a variety of symptoms.
Symptoms of sensory nerve damage:
- Pain when walking, fastening buttons etc;
- Sensitivity;
- Numbness in the hands or feet;
- Tingling or prickling in the hands or feet;
- Burning sensations or changes in temperatures;
- Problems with positional awareness and balance issues.
The Best Treatments for Nerve Pain and Nerve Damage
Although the nerve damage cannot be cured entirely, still there are some treatments that can reduce the symptoms. Because nerve damage is often progressive, it is very important to consult with a doctor when you first notice symptoms in order to reduce the chance of permanent damage of the nerve.
The first step of the treatment is to recognize the condition that’s causing your nerve pain or nerve damage. Remember, people with diabetes, and obesity are more prone of having problems with the nerves. Also, correcting nutritional deficiencies, changing medications when drugs, taking medications to treat autoimmune disease are causing nerve damage and pain.
Treatment with pain relievers
- Tricyclic antidepressants such as amitriptyline and desipramine (Norpramin), as well as other antidepressants, including duloxetine (Cymbalta) and venlafaxine (Effexor XR)
- Certain anti-seizure drugs, including neurontin (Gabapentin) pregabalin (Lyrica)
- Capsaicin cream
Treatment with complementary and alternative approaches may also help alleviate your nerve pain and discomfort, such as:
- Acupuncture
- Biofeedback
- Hypnosis
- Meditation
- Antioxidant vitamins
- Electrical nerve stimulation such as TENS
Surgery for nerve damage and traumatic nerve injury
The surgery for nerve damage and traumatic nerve injury is also known as nerve grafting. During this procedure, the surgeon takes a healthy piece of nerve from another location on your body and uses it to reconnect the two ends of the damaged nerve. After the reconnections, the surgeon uses wound closure devices that include specially designed sutures, staples, and mechanical apparatus to close the wounds by manipulating edges of the wound tissue closer together.
The nerve damage surgery recovery time is approximately one month. You’ll have follow-up appointments with your surgeon, during which he determines how your nerve regeneration is progressing. Nerve fibers have to grow down the full length of the damaged nerve to where the nerve and muscle intersect. That can take between around six months to one year.