Ice that knee to banish pain

Just five minutes in an ice chamber may make you feel years younger and help to ease arthritis – just ask the UK’s Rachel Adlington.

Ms Adlington suffers from a form of arthritis and has been undergoing ‘ice treatment’. Some experts believe intense cold could be used to treat ankylosing spondylitis and other chronic inflammatory conditions such as osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis.

The chamber itself looks like a shower cubicle, big enough to hold two people without touching the sides and it is chilled down to minus 80 Celsius.

When Ms Adlington reportedly heard of ice treatment, she was willing to try it.

She had always found cold helped relieve her pain and inflammation and would use ice packs on swollen areas, occasionally even sleeping with them on because they eased the pain.

The trial at the BMI Garden Hospital in Hendon, North London, involved treating patients in a cryotherapy chamber.

The theory is the intense cold stimulates the body’s natural anti-inflammatory chemicals and pain-relieving hormones.

As Dr Colin Crosby, a consultant in Sports and Exercise Medicine at the hospital explains: “When you go outdoors on a snowy day, your hands and feet and other extremities go numb.

“This is because the blood is being pumped to your main organs and brain to protect them.

“Then when you go back inside the blood is flushed back into the system. That’s why your hands tingle.”

According to Dr Crosby, if you have a five-fold increase in that cold and you stay in the chamber, the blood will do the same and flow to your brain and main organs.

“When you come out, the reaction means a huge blood flow to other areas including those which are damaged.

“The endocrine system is stimulated by the intense cold, and releases a whole host of chemicals including anti–inflammatory markers and pain-relieving hormones.

“The body also releases feel-good endorphins and adrenaline to help the body in repairing injury.”

Ms Adlington and two other members of the patient charity, the National Ankylosing Spondylitis Society, went to the hospital in May to have twice-weekly, five-minute sessions in the cryo-chamber, followed by a physiotherapy session.

During their sessions in the ice chamber, the patients wear the briefest of swimming costumes and hats, gloves, socks, mules and masks to protect their extremities. The effect is greater when more flesh is exposed to the cold, it is claimed. Those using the chamber must also avoid touching its walls.

Cryotherapy originated in Japan in the 70s, and is now increasingly being used by athletes to boost injury healing and training.

Ms Adlington tells the UK’s The Daily Mail, the effects of the ice treatment are immediate.

“While I’m in there, it’s like someone switching off the pain. I feel normal; I have my old body back.

“It’s like seeing a good movie and saying to someone you have to go and see it because I can’t describe it. When I first came out of it, I was really emotional because I felt loose and free.

“To be in pain all those years and find something that switches it off is amazing.”

National Pain Week is held this week. According to Chronic Pain Australia (CPA’s), suffering from chronic pain is now recognised as the third largest “health problem” in Australia, with one in five Australians suffering from some form of chronic pain.