pain and weather Archives - Minnesota Physical Medicine Blog

The weather can affect your mood, but can it also affect how pain is expressed and felt in your body? According to new research out of the United Kingdom, certain whether patterns may make your chronic pain condition worse. Below, we take a closer look at what the study uncovered, and we explain why certain weather patterns may lead to a chronic pain flareup.

Chronic Pain and The Weather

To better understand how weather systems affected individuals with pain, researchers from the University of Manchester conducted a 15-month study involving more than 13,000 people living with chronic pain. Patients were asked to record their pain intensity each day with the help of a smartphone app. GPS location data was also used to record the weather data for the individual’s location. Researchers ranked all tracked days, and the most painful days saw 23 percent of participants report an increase in pain, whereas only 10 percent said the same on the days ranked as the least painful days.

Researchers took the 45 highest ranking days for pain and averaged the weather conditions to determine the weather patterns that were present on the days when the most amount of people were in pain. The same was done for the 45 lowest ranking days. Here’s what they found:

On the most painful days, the jet stream was aimed right at the UK, with below-normal pressure over the UK.
On the most painful days, the humidity and precipitation rate were both above-normal.
On the least painful days, there was above-normal pressure over the UK.
On the least painful days, the humidity and precipitation rate were both below-normal, and winds were weaker.

Co-lead researchers Professor David Schultz, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Manchester, and Professor Will Dixon, had this to say about the study:

“Over 2400 years ago, Hippocrates wrote that different wind directions could bring better or worse health to individuals,” said Professor Dixon. “The belief by people living with long-term pain conditions, such as arthritis, that their pain is affected by the weather remains prevalent today, with about 75% of people with chronic pain believing this to be true. Yet, there is disagreement over what weather condition makes their pain worse.”

“Part of the reason for this lack of consensus is that previous researchers have treated the different measures of the weather such as pressure, temperature, humidity separately, which assumes that one could vary the temperature while holding all of the other weather measures fixed,” said Professor Schultz. “Of course, the real atmosphere does not behave like this, as all the variables are changing simultaneously. A simple analysis clearly won’t do to get at understanding how weather affects pain.”

The leading theory is that when low pressure systems arrives, the pressure against your joints drops as well, which can make swelling and inflammation worse. Our bodies then react to this inflammation, which can lead to an increase in pain sensations. It’s far from a concrete science, but this study seems to provide more proof that there is at least a correlation between certain weather conditions and an increase or decrease in chronic pain.

Many people who suffer from pain feel worse when it is cold outside. Those who have joint problems like osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, nerve damage and muscle disease have more pain when the temperature drops. If we have been told to use ice to prevent injuries from hurting, many ask why they feel worse when cold weather settles in. The reason for feeling pain is the same reason we actually use ice packs to prevent pain. Cold can slow the transmission of the nerves. Placing ice on an injury keeps inflammation down and reduces the ability to transmit pain signals.

Chronic conditions that cause pain often become worse with the cold. When the body is cold, muscles, tendons, ligaments and joints do not move as well as when they are warm. Joints become stiff from the joint fluid not flowing as smoothly.

In the cold, muscles, ligaments and tendons are also stiff. The body is not much different than many other materials when exposed to cold. Materials like plastic become brittle when exposed to cold and become more pliable when warm. The body is not much different. When cold, many structures become stiff and do not move as well. As the structures in the body are warmed up, they move better and smoother. If a structure is not moving well, it is likely we feel it and sense the abnormality of movement. Most people feel the change in sensation of movement as discomfort, stiffness, aches or pain.

Frozen Nerves

Cold can also stimulate nerves. Some pain fibers respond specifically to the cold and send signals of pain when they sense it. Furthermore, a large portion of the nervous system functions to inhibit abnormal signals. Cold slows nerve transmission in general and thus slows the body’s ability to inhibit signals. The body’s ability to control pain signals are also impaired and slowed by cold.

Winter is here, and the weather is unlikely to get much better for several months. When it is cold outside, it is important to keep your body warm to reduce pain. Warmth allows the body to function more normally. Normal body temperature allows the fabric of the body to move smoothly. Keeping the body close to normal temperature allows its structure to function the best with the least amount of pain.