How to relieve dysmenorrhea pain? What should I pay attention to?

Author: Wang Biqin, Chief Physician, Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine

Reviewer: Bai Wenpei, Chief Physician, Beijing Century Altar Hospital, Capital Medical University

Dysmenorrhea is very common in clinical practice, and approximately 80% of women have experienced dysmenorrhea once or more.

Generally speaking, menstruation is accompanied by mild discomfort in the lumbar and sacral area, or mild distension and pain in the lower abdomen, which does not affect normal life and study and is not considered pathological dysmenorrhea.

If the pain seriously affects life, such as lower abdominal pain accompanied by nausea and vomiting, the patient cannot work at all; some patients even sweat profusely on their faces and have to stay in bed curled up when dysmenorrhea occurs, and they cannot even lie flat. In these cases, dysmenorrhea should be treated in the hospital in time.

Figure 1 Original copyright image, no permission to reprint

1. What are the types of dysmenorrhea?

Dysmenorrhea is generally divided into primary dysmenorrhea and secondary dysmenorrhea.

What is primary dysmenorrhea? In most cases, primary dysmenorrhea may not cause pain in the first three months after menarche, but it will occur six months later. Most cases occur within one year after menarche, which means that primary dysmenorrhea will occur soon after menarche.

What is secondary dysmenorrhea? Secondary dysmenorrhea means that you did not have dysmenorrhea before, for example, you did not have dysmenorrhea in the first few years of menarche, but now you have dysmenorrhea after more than ten or twenty years of menstruation. In other words, it does not appear shortly after menarche, but only appears later. Some people even have dysmenorrhea after giving birth.

Generally speaking, primary dysmenorrhea is functional dysmenorrhea, which means there is no organic change.

Secondary dysmenorrhea often involves organic changes, such as adenomyosis, endometriosis, gynecological inflammation, uterine fibroids, ovarian cysts, endometrial polyps, etc. There are also some uterine malformations, such as vaginal septate or transverse uterine septate, rudimentary horn of the uterus, etc. These organic diseases may cause dysmenorrhea.

2. How to relieve dysmenorrhea pain?

For Western medicine, since the main cause of dysmenorrhea is excessive secretion of prostaglandins, anti-inflammatory analgesics such as indomethacin and some other common painkillers are very effective.

But there is a problem with painkillers, which is that the dosage may increase over time.

When treating dysmenorrhea with traditional Chinese medicine, it is best to start taking the medicine at least one week before your period, so that dysmenorrhea can be significantly relieved during your period.

In the treatment of dysmenorrhea, TCM pays more attention to daily conditioning. Many patients know about uterine cold, which is divided into deficiency cold and excess cold. In the treatment of dysmenorrhea before menstruation, it is very important to add some blood circulation, blood stasis and uterine warming drugs while nourishing the kidney, especially warming the uterus. The daily conditioning of dysmenorrhea treatment focuses on nourishing qi and blood, regulating qi and blood, and warming the kidney yang.

Of course, TCM treatment of dysmenorrhea is not limited to oral Chinese medicine, but also includes a variety of other effective methods, such as acupuncture, moxibustion and massage. In addition, you can also apply heated medicine to the navel (called Shenque point in TCM), which is particularly effective in relieving dysmenorrhea symptoms. These are very commonly used methods.

3. What must patients with dysmenorrhea pay attention to?

Diet and daily life are very important.

Many female friends feel particularly afraid of cold when experiencing dysmenorrhea, and need to cover themselves with thick quilts, or even cover their abdomens with large hot water bottles, or drink some hot ginger water or brown sugar water to relieve symptoms. This shows that most cases of dysmenorrhea tend to be caused by a cold constitution.

Therefore, it is recommended that patients should not be too greedy for coolness, wear thicker and longer pants with higher waist. In winter, they should pay more attention to keeping warm. Eat less cold foods, such as popsicles, cold drinks, and ice cream. Eat more ginger and soak your feet properly. For patients with coldness, soaking feet is very effective.

Figure 2 Original copyright image, no permission to reprint

During menstruation, the loss of Qi and blood is more significant. At this time, the deficiency of Qi and blood and the deficiency of Yang in the uterus are more obvious. Therefore, patients may feel soreness and swelling in the waist and sacrum, feel colder than usual, and feel cold in the knees and even the whole body. Therefore, it is very important to keep warm during menstruation.

In addition, moderate exercise can also help relieve dysmenorrhea. For example, lying on the knees and chest can adjust the position of the uterus, which can help relieve dysmenorrhea caused by excessive posterior tilt or anteflexion of the uterus. In particular, excessive posterior tilt can cause poor menstrual blood flow. For such patients, it is recommended to sleep on your stomach to promote blood circulation and thus relieve the symptoms of dysmenorrhea.

In addition, smokers have a higher incidence of dysmenorrhea than the general population, so it is best for women not to smoke. At the same time, keeping a happy mood, not being nervous, and relaxing are also very helpful in relieving dysmenorrhea.