Joint Pain Documentation

At times keeping documentation on your daily joint pain is the best way to a solution. Keeping a medical journal helps identify what you were doing and what kind of environments you were in at the time that the joint pain occurred. This process will also assist your doctor in prescribing the best treatment for you. When keeping records of your joint pain this is what you should be aware of:

Location

Documenting the location of your pain is extremely important in making sure that the correct areas of the body are being targeted and getting the extra treatment they require. This way when treated correctly it assist you in completing you daily activities and desires with less, little, or even no joint pain. Some things you should remember when recording joint pain is where it is centralized and which joints hurt. Also try to pinpoint if it’s on both sides of the joint or only on one when writing all this down.

Timing

Pain is seldom consistent if ever. It may come and go or it may stay around for long periods of time. So it is important to document how long the pain sticks around and if it’s the same type of pain or does it feel different. It helps a doctor to know if your pain suddenly appears out of nowhere and is at its most painful or if it slowly starts out and the pain increases. It is also important to jot down if the levels of pain or intensity. Such as is it severe, extreme, dull, or mild? Do you have pain that is constant or does it come and go. Is it reoccurring? All these factors play a major role on how severe your joint pain is.

Aggravating Factors

In some instances joint pain can be caused by some activity or task and not just a steady pain that appears for no reason. When you are doing an activity that starts to irritate your joints make sure to write it down. Include all the details of the activity such as what time was it, the intensity of the pain, and how long did it last. Keep in mind that documenting whether you were at rest or moving at the time the pain worsened is essential in treatment.

Alleviating Factors

To be completely certain that you are receiving the best possible treatment keeping a log of all the factors mentioned above are crucial, but there are some other factors that play a very important role as well. Such as the time when there is no pain, or does the pain worsen when you are at rest or moving. Or maybe it helps with the pain if you add heat or maybe better if it’s massaged away.

There are many solutions to joint pain at times its simply your body position or keeping the joint elevated that will alleviate some discomfort. Then of course, there are prescription medications the help control joint pain but sometimes it’s been recorded that a more natural or herbal treatment works better. With joint pain it’s a good idea to experiment with self care measures as well as these other treatments and record your experiences. This way you will get the one that works best for you.