Causes of joint pain with flu
The virus, having entered the body, begins its active activity. It attaches to the cell and strives to penetrate inside it. Having overcome the envelope, the virus turns the cell into an incubator for the creation of microorganisms similar to itself. Otherwise, viruses cannot reproduce. Tissue cells under the influence of infection in the tissues begin to become inflamed. Muscle tissues have special cells responsible for pain sensations. They are the ones who react sharply to the appearance of the flu, which is why a person feels aches throughout the body - the body reacts this way to the pathogen.
How to distinguish a cold from other diseases?
A cold is an unpleasant phenomenon, but relatively safe. However, other, more serious diseases can manifest exactly the same symptoms. Therefore you need to know the following:
- Fever does not always occur with a cold. It never exceeds 39 degrees and subsides after a maximum of two days. Otherwise, we are no longer talking about ARVI, but about the flu.
- A sore throat does not always indicate a cold. If it does not go away for a long time, it is accompanied by enlarged lymph nodes and the appearance of purulent plaque on the tonsils, this indicates tonsillitis (tonsillitis). Antibacterial therapy is already required here.
- A cough with acute respiratory infections lasts no longer than two weeks. If it continues, it is possible that pneumocystis, fungi or mycoplasma have entered the body.
So you shouldn’t attribute any ailment to a cold. Otherwise, there is a high risk of not paying attention to the emerging dangerous disease. It will be more difficult to treat in the future.
What is the danger of influenza
More than 3 billion people suffer from influenza every year around the globe, and 3 million of them die every year from this infection. Joint pain is not the worst thing that can happen to someone with the flu. The dangerous virus feels most comfortable on the walls of the epithelium in the respiratory tract, especially in the lungs.
Signs characteristic of influenza:
- Fever – body temperature can instantly soar to 40˚C.
- Intoxication of the body, manifested by general weakness, lack of appetite, sometimes nausea and vomiting.
- The flu affects the capillaries of the lungs, and therefore the main respiratory organ swells and cannot function normally.
Pneumonia that develops with influenza most often has a viral etiology, which means that not a single antibiotic will help fight the infection. Failure to provide timely medical care can lead to the death of the patient.
General recommendations
Rarely does anyone immediately consult a doctor when the first symptoms appear. The first two or three days you can just lie down. But if after four days your health does not begin to improve or worsens, you cannot do without medical help.
If you are convinced that you have ARVI, you can use the following methods to ease the course of the disease:
- drink more (especially if you have a fever);
- refrain from smoking;
- rest (ideally sleep) as long as possible;
- dress comfortably (you can wrap yourself in blankets only if you are cold);
- ventilate the room;
- humidify the air.
Vitamins will also help. In addition to citrus fruits, black currants, sea buckthorn and ginger provide the vitamin C necessary for a cold body. Honey will help strengthen your immune system.
How to deal with joint pain due to the flu
The body's overall fight against the virus requires a huge amount of energy. Therefore, doctors insist on bed rest at the first manifestations of the disease. In addition, you should not force feed a patient if his appetite has decreased. A person experiences a feeling of hunger not only because more than three hours have passed since eating and his stomach is empty, but also because the digestive organs are in a state of readiness to digest a new portion of food.
If the patient does not want to eat, it means that his pancreas is not ready to process proteins and fats, and the liver has not yet filled the gallbladder. That is, the gastrointestinal tract is not ready to digest, break down and absorb food. Force feeding can lead to allergic reactions of a food nature, and unabsorbed minerals can be deposited in the joints, leading to the formation of salts or breaking down cartilage tissue.
If you have severe joint pain, you can take painkillers aimed specifically at the type of pain that occurs with the flu:
- Ibuprofen.
- Paracetamol.
Both drugs also have an antipyretic effect, which explains the relief of the condition when trying to bring down a high temperature with these medications.
Ibuprofen, according to medical research, is effective specifically for pain caused by inflammatory processes, which is typical for the flu. Paracetamol, also an analgesic, relieves pain due to viral infection to a lesser extent, but the drug can relieve pain for 4-6 hours.
If the body temperature is not high - up to 39˚, then it is not worth bringing it down, which means taking ibuprofen and paracetamol is highly undesirable. Otherwise, by lowering the temperature, the patient will stop the production of life-saving interferon, which may worsen his condition. Therefore, joint pain will have to be dealt with using local therapy.
As painkillers, you can choose gels and ointments with diclofenac or ketoprofen. Such drugs will act directly on painful areas, without having a systemic effect on the entire body. For pain in the feet, you can take warm salt baths for 15 minutes every 4 hours, relieving tension and removing stagnant fluid from the lower extremities.
If a child complains of joint pain, you should not self-medicate - you should immediately consult a specialist. It is important to remember that taking aspirin is strictly contraindicated in patients under 18 years of age. It is banned in many European countries and for adults. The age limit in our country is connected only with the fact that after reaching the age of majority a person has the right to decide whether to take a dangerous drug or not.
Aspirin, or more precisely, its active ingredient acetylsalicylic acid, having, like ibuprofen, an antipyretic, anti-inflammatory and analgesic effect, affects the hematopoietic system. It will reduce platelet levels, causing anemia and increasing the duration of bleeding. If the severity of the flu leads to pulmonary edema and damage to the blood vessels of the lung tissue, taking aspirin will become a fatal mistake, due to which it will be impossible to stop pulmonary bleeding.
Body aches not associated with a cold
Sometimes discomfort in muscles or joints can be a completely natural reaction of the body to physical activity2, for example, if this is your first workout or you started exercising after a long break. Even in healthy people, similar symptoms often appear after a long walk in cold weather, being in an uncomfortable position or psycho-emotional stress2.
The following diseases and disorders can be the cause of joint pain2:
- allergic reactions;
- diabetes;
- vegetative-vascular dystonia (neurosis);
- blood diseases;
- dysfunction of the thyroid gland;
- chronic intestinal diseases;
- chronic hepatitis and cholecystitis;
- metabolic disorders;
- tumors.
You can get rid of discomfort only by eliminating its cause. Therefore, it is so important, regardless of whether body aches are accompanied by an increase in temperature or not, to consult a doctor and begin the necessary treatment in a timely manner.
How to ease the flu with joint pain
The flu cannot be carried on your feet. Excessive physical activity not only steals strength from the body, delaying the moment of recovery, but also aggravates pain in the joints. The more the patient spends in bed and warm, the easier the flu will be, which will also affect the severity of the aches.
An important condition for the active functioning of the immune system is a large amount of fluid consumed. Preference should be given to oral rehydration solutions, the intake of which will restore the water-salt balance in cells and tissues. If you don’t have such a powder at home, you can drink fruit drinks, compotes, herbal tea and just clean drinking water.
It is important that the temperature of the drink is close to the patient’s body temperature - this will ensure rapid absorption of the drink from the gastrointestinal tract. Taking cold drinks, which, according to many, should lower the patient’s body temperature, on the contrary, can worsen the situation. Upon contact with cold liquid, the vessels and capillaries of the gastrointestinal tract narrow, stopping both heat transfer and absorption ability.
Cure a cold in one day
Medicines that are freely sold in all pharmacies will help us with this. Our goal is to quickly eliminate symptoms.
| Symptom | What do you need | Examples of active ingredients |
| General weakness and fever | Antipyretic, anti-inflammatory, analgesic | Ibuprofen Paracetamol |
| A sore throat | Antiseptics | Hexethidine Biclotymol Ambazon |
| Runny nose | Antiseptics, decongestants, vasoconstrictors | Xylometazoline Sea water Phenylephrine |
| Cough | Secretolytics, mucolytics | Ambroxol Bromhexine Thermopsis herb Ginger rhizome extract Acetylcysteine |
Myths about colds
Although acute respiratory infection has been known to medicine for a long time, there are still myths about its treatment methods and precautions. We have collected the most popular of them:
| Myth | In fact |
| If you have a cold, you should keep the windows closed and not go outside. | Fresh air is the enemy of the virus. Regular ventilation keeps the house free from infections. |
| The patient needs to be warmed. | No one has canceled the body’s need for normal thermoregulation. Overheating is no less dangerous than hypothermia. |
| A person with a cold should not wash. | In cold water it’s really not worth it, because hypothermia weakens the immune system. It’s possible and even necessary in a warm place. The patient sweats, and with then toxins come out. They need to be washed off. |
| Ice cream is a surefire way to catch a cold. | The cause of the disease is a virus, not a cold. Whether a person will eat so much ice cream to weaken their immune system is a big question. When you have a sore throat, this dessert is actually useful. It relieves swelling, inhibits the inflammatory process and reduces discomfort. |
Additional measures
Some categories of patients are particularly sensitive to certain drugs. For some they are completely contraindicated. Additional measures must be taken to treat such patients. So, in the first trimester of pregnancy, taking medications is generally undesirable. It is better to use folk remedies. In the last three months you should not drink a lot of liquid. Although this helps to cope with ARVI, the consequences can be serious. Sodium leaching and kidney overload are very dangerous for a pregnant woman.
When treating children under three years of age, essential oils are contraindicated. If they help an adult to recover, in a child, the course of the disease, on the contrary, may become more severe. In addition, the risk of an allergic reaction from an incompletely formed immune system cannot be ruled out.
Is there a cure specifically for colds?
The listed groups of medications have a complex effect on all inflammatory foci. But it wouldn’t hurt to undergo antiviral therapy. For this purpose, the following active ingredients are used:
- interferon (“Grippferon”);
- rimantadine (“Remantadine”);
- tilorone ("Lavomax");
- umifenovir (Arbidol).
It is recommended to consult a doctor before taking them. Colds are easily treated with symptomatic treatment. But if there are no positive changes within a few days (or even get worse), it’s probably not an acute respiratory infection. Flu, sore throat and other illnesses that start out like a cold can have serious consequences. Therefore, if your health worsens, it is important to consult a doctor promptly.
Diagnosis of muscle pain
Determining why myalgia occurs is not always easy. Only a doctor can understand the causes and select treatment that helps get rid of disturbing symptoms or alleviate them. To find out the cause of myalgia, the doctor conducts a comprehensive examination, including a neurological one, prescribes laboratory tests, ultrasound, computed tomography and other research methods3.
Various specialists treat myalgia. Depending on its cause, a traumatologist, rheumatologist, neurologist or endocrinologist can help you.
When should a sick person see a doctor?
A healthy body can and should overcome a mild ARVI that occurs without serious symptoms in 5–7 days. If within a week the symptoms do not go away or even worsen, we can almost certainly talk about a complication of a seemingly unimportant disease.
The patient may experience symptoms of laryngitis or pharyngitis, tonsillitis, rhinitis, signs of inflammation of the paranasal sinuses - sinusitis or sinusitis, otitis, tracheitis, bronchitis and even pneumonia. In this case, even if the temperature has not risen, you should definitely contact either your family doctor or a good ENT doctor in Moscow.
Doctors include dangerous symptoms:
- difficulty or increased breathing;
- the appearance of wheezing;
- long lasting cough;
- chest pain;
- significant increase in temperature;
- severe pain in the forehead;
- fainting state;
- confused consciousness, inability to navigate in space;
- severe vomiting.
Other reasons
Almost any disease of the internal organs can lead to myalgia11. When an organ is affected, it creates pain impulses that are partially transmitted to the muscles located nearby11.
Myalgia can also be caused by:
- endocrine diseases, such as thyroid hormone deficiency16,7;
- vascular pathologies that disrupt the nutrition of the muscles of the limbs15,16;
- chronic fatigue syndrome7;
- imbalance of microelements in the body16;
- taking medications that lower blood cholesterol levels12.
to come back to the beginning