Understanding Injection Therapy for Car Accident Injuries

Written by CrashMD staff

Unfortunately you’ve been in a car accident. Fortunately, there are a wide range of minimally invasive treatment options that can help you find pain relief after the car accident. The first step is to immediately seek care from a pain management specialist who is highly trained in recognizing and treating pain symptoms. Most often, and depending on the severity of the injury, the specialist could recommend physical therapy, pain medications, and alternative treatments such as acupuncture and chiropractic care. However, if those fail to provide long-term relief, or the pain symptoms are still creating a diminished quality of life, then the next best option is injection therapy. 

Injection therapy for pain is a minimally-invasive option that targets the specific area of pain. Unlike taking pain medication that affects the entire body, an injection into the particular joint or soft tissue area of the body helps to direct the medication exactly where it needs to go. If you’ve suffered a car accident and are still looking for relief, speak to your pain management specialist about injection therapy. 

Car Accident Pain

Regardless if you’ve been in a minor fender bender, or had a high-speed crash, it’s commonplace to feel pain and soreness. Your body isn’t built to be traveling at a certain speed, endure a collision, and come to a complete halt in just a couple of seconds. The best case scenario is that you come out unscathed, but even if you have just a couple light bumps and bruises that go away with at-home treatments, that’s also a great goal. A person could suffer from acute pain, which is temporary pain that subsides as the body heals. But then there is chronic pain, which is persistent pain that lingers as a result of the injury in the first place. 

There are instances where additional treatment is needed to help both alleviate pain and inflammation symptoms now, as well as avoid any chronic pain from arising. 

The most common non-life threatening injuries that happen during a car accident include: 

• Soft tissue injuries: these are the most common types of car accident injuries and include whiplash, sprains and strains
• Neck injuries: sprains and stiffness that could cause symptoms such as headaches, dizziness, lightheadedness and fatigue
• Chest injuries: usually due to the seatbelt and most often cause bruising
• Broken bones: most often from coming into contact with something in the car, like the steering wheel or door, the most common broken bones could be the ribs, arms or legs
• Head injuries: again, usually do to the head hitting something in the car, head injuries could lead to concussions, traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), scrapes, cuts or bruises
• Organ damage: this could be caused by something coming into contact with the body during the accident, or the organs in the body hitting other bones and organs from the impact. 
• Facial injuries: similar to head injuries, a person could suffer fractures, cuts or burns, depending on the nature of the accident
• Psychological injuries: PTSD, anxiety, insomnia, depression, etc. 

While injection therapy isn’t necessarily going to help a broken bone, it could help from the symptoms associated with the broken bone. This could include radiating pain that is felt from nerves around the injury site that is causing pain in the feet, for instance. The best way to determine the best treatment method for you is to place your care in a pain management specialist who can recommend the best treatment plan to help you achieve your pain relief goals. 

Injection Therapy Options

Injection therapy plays a crucial role in helping a person find pain relief after a car accident. Not only does it provide immediate and targeted pain relief, it also helps to reduce inflammation, promote healing, and prevent further complications from occurring. 

Depending on the extent of your injury and your pain symptoms, the below injections could be used to help find relief: 

1. Local Anesthetic Injections: for patients who are suffering from minor injuries or acute pain, an injection of local anesthetic helps to temporarily numb the area so the patient can feel immediate relief. They are also used in conjunction with steroid injections to help with pain relief, as well as with other procedures so the patient is more comfortable. 
2. Corticosteroid Injections: these injections, usually administered with an anesthetic, help to alleviate inflammation and pain. They are a common treatment method for swelling associated with sprains and strains, as well as joint injuries. Most patients are able to experience profound pain relief after just one injection, which helps them to more comfortably enjoy physical therapy or take advantage of additional treatment options, all of which to help promote a faster period of recovery. 
3. Epidural Steroid Injections: this method delivers medication directly into the epidural space surrounding the spinal cord and is an effective treatment for back pain. Again, patients are able to experience significant pain and inflammation relief that allows them to more comfortably utilize other treatment options. 
4. Nerve block injections: these targeted injections help to block the affected nerves from sending pain signals to the brain, thereby reducing the feelings of pain. They are an attractive option for patients who have tried other pain management options, such as physical therapy and pain medications, but who are still in pain. 
5. Hyaluronic Acid Injections: a common treatment for managing pain from osteoarthritis, this injection option uses a naturally occurring substance that is found in the joint fluid in the body. By injecting more of this acid into the joint, the joint has more cushion and fluidity, which helps a person to move without bone-on-bone friction and pain. 
6. Platelet-Rich Plasma (PRP) Injections: another more natural injection option is PRP injections, which takes platelets from a person’s own blood to give the body a healing boost. Platelets contain many growth factors that help to promote healing in the form of tissue repair and regeneration, so if a person’s injuries are healing slowly, this would accelerate the process. 

All of these options are minimally-invasive options that can be comfortably performed in a pain management specialist’s office as an outpatient procedure. This means that there is significantly less recovery time compared to surgery options, allowing the patient to experience pain relief and enjoy the daily activities quickly. 

The main reason why injection therapy for pain is so helpful is that it is targeted treatment. The provider can inject the medication or substance directly into the source of pain, which helps to provide an immediate reduction or pain and inflammation. This all translates into improved healing times and increased mobility and functionality for the patient. 

Benefits and Risks of Injection Therapy

Overall, injection therapy is a low risk, high reward treatment option for patients who are looking for pain relief after a car accident. The main benefit is that it is a minimally-invasive option that helps patients find immediate pain relief, without having to utilize surgical options. Another benefit is that it helps patients find relief without having to rely on taking pain medications for extended periods of time. Not only is this helpful for patients who don’t want the long-term side effects of pain medications, but it is also helpful for patients who cannot take pain medications and who haven’t been able to find relief with physical therapy. One injection lasts significantly longer than “take one pill every four hours,” and is a safer option overall. 

The main risk is infection at the injection site, or allergic reaction to the medication. However, this is why it’s important to partner with a trained pain management specialist who is expertly skilled at administering injection therapies and reviewing your complete medical history to ensure no allergies occur.

Most patients can expect to feel minor tenderness or soreness at the injection site, which usually subsides within hours or a day. The vast majority of patients report feeling profound pain relief that has allowed them to enjoy the same quality of life they experienced before the car accident. 

Do I Need Injection Therapy?

If you have been in a car accident and are still experiencing pain, injection therapy could work for you. Specifically:

• I’ve tried pain medication but I’m still in pain
• I’ve tried physical therapy but I’m still in pain
• My pain is getting worse
• My quality of life has diminished
• I’m not able to perform daily activities
• My pain is keeping me up at night

Not only is the goal to help patients experience pain relief now, patients should also be aware that by not managing pain now, they run the risk of experiencing chronic pain for years to come, which could create more issues down the line. It’s unfortunate enough that you were in a car accident, you certainly don’t want the painful effects of the crash to stay with you forever. 

If you have been in a car accident and haven’t been able to find needed relief, injection therapy could be right for you. They are a widely used and valuable treatment method for managing pain and promoting healing for people who have sustained painful injuries from a car accident. The type of injection depends on each patient’s specific pain symptoms, so it’s important to partner with a trained pain management specialist who can review your symptoms, as well as your medical history, and recommend the best injection for you. Injections can both help patients experience immediate pain relief, as well as help them avoid any chronic issues in the future. If you’ve tried pain medications and at-home methods but are still experiencing lingering pain, please schedule an appointment with the CrashMD team today. We are dedicated to helping you find pain relief after your accident.