marzNC
Angel Diva
For what it's worth, I didn't do RICE when I injured my knee. I was in China at the time. My older cousin and my parent's friend who is a research physician were very clear that after the first 24 hours I should keep my knee warm, not cold. The idea was to promote blood flow, which is part of promoting healing in that sort of injury. I found a video back then that was pretty detailed about why icing was a bad idea. The target audience of the video was weight lifters, both amateur and professional. It made sense to me.Someone just told me that it's been shown that RICE is not only ineffective, but may retard healing. What?? I'd never heard that, so I started reading about it. Huh.
My mother took a Chinese approach to healing after breaking a leg at age 70 (around 1984). She took Yunnan Baiyao and stayed off her feet as much as possible the first 6 weeks. Also ate stuff considered good in Chinese tradition, like homemade bone broth. She had a full leg cast even though the break was near the ankle. She had a bed moved to the main floor so she didn't have to deal with stairs. Got a wheelchair for going around the house. Could stand fine for cooking.
Her doctor was totally astonished at her first checkup. He'd told her in the ER that she would be in a cast for up to 6 months given her age. His comment after seeing the X-ray result was that she was healing like a 40yo. The rest of her recovery was based on quick healing, not the typical scenario for a senior.