Does the weather affect your pain levels?
One of the more common sentences we hear when we ask patients what makes their pain worse is ‘the cold’ or ‘when it gets damp’. A lot of people who suffer from osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis also report that the weather affects their joints. In fact 2/3 of people who have musculoskeletal pain will report that the weather will make their pains worse (1), but how true is that and what kind of weather change affects people’s pain levels?
There is no doubt that the environment and weather affect our health, for instance, an increase in localized air pollution results in an increase in heart, lung, and cancer mortality (2), whereas an increase in temperature results in more common deaths from heart attacks and coronary heart disease (3). Even though many people consider the weather as an exacerbating factor for their pain the evidence for this is lacking.
The most common weather people mention that worsens their pain is the temperature. A recent large-scale review of 11 studies showed this not to be the case when considering the pain from osteoarthritis and low back pain, however, they did find that temperatures above 21C combined with low humidity (under 60%) doubled the risk of a flare-up of pain in people who suffer from gout (4).
What about humidity? It’s a common thing to hear said that ‘the damp affects my joints’, the same review showed that an increase in humidity does produce a small but significant increase in general musculoskeletal pain when humidity rises, but for more specific conditions like osteoarthritis and low back pain symptom severity reporting remained the same (4).
Also, if the cold and damp weather produced more pain then you would expect people living in countries that were colder and wetter to have more
pain, in fact the opposite is true, people with osteoarthritis who live in colder climates report less pain than those in warmer climes (5).
There is also no real increase in symptoms reported when the air pressure changes, in fact two studies included in the review measured a reduction in musculoskeletal pain symptoms when the air pressure rose (6).
We get a lot of rain in this country (seems like all the time at the minute) but the rain has absolutely no effect on the reporting of pain of any kind (4)!
Strangely an increase in wind speed does result in a very small (but clinically insignificant) increase in the development of low back pain (7).
So why do people commonly report that the weather affects their pain levels? The answer may be that these people have other features that influence their pain. People who report weather sensitivity in relation to their pain tend to exhibit more anxiety which may lead to a change in how they report their pain (8). Also, exposure to the changes in weather may influence reporting, people in warmer countries are outside more and are exposed to more changes in the weather making them more aware of the relationship between the weather and their pain (1).
The answer to the question ‘does the weather affect your pain?’ appears to be not directly, but it may affect how you view your pain and what you associate changes in your pain levels to be caused by. Even so, my mum and I both get a headache when a storm is coming so who knows?
Do you want to know what is causing your pain and if we can help? Why not take advantage of our new patient assessment introductory offer to get you started towards a tailor-made recovery plan for only £19.
Are you in a lot of pain and want to get better as soon as possible? If so then why not book in for a new patient consultation, with treatment on the day, for £72.
We are also there to help you from home. Take a look at our suite of exercise resources and advice sheets which you can easily download and use from home.
References
1 – E.J. Timmermans, S. van der Pas, L.A. Schaap, et al. Self-perceived weather sensitivity and joint pain in older people with osteoarthritis in six European countries: results from the European Project on OSteoArthritis (EPOSA) BMC Musculoskelet Disord, 15 (2014), p. 66.
2 – A.S. Shah, J.P. Langrish, H. Nair, et al. Global association of air pollution and heart failure: a systematic review and meta-analysis, Lancet, 382 (9897) (2013), pp. 1039-1048.
3 – J. Liu, B.M. Varghese, A. Hansen, et al. Heat exposure and cardiovascular health outcomes: a systematic review and meta-analysis, Lancet Planet Health, 6 (6) (2022), pp. e484-ee95.
4 – Ferreira ML, Hunter DJ, Fu A, Raihana S, Urquhart D, Ferreira PH. Come rain or shine: Is weather a risk factor for musculoskeletal pain? A systematic review with meta-analysis of case-crossover studies. Semin Arthritis Rheum. 2024 Apr;65:152392. doi: 10.1016/j.semarthrit.2024.152392. Epub 2024 Jan 28. PMID: 38340613.
5 – Jamison RN, Anderson KO, Slater MA: Weather changes and pain: perceived influence of local climate on pain complaint in chronic pain patients. Pain. 1995, 61: 309-315. 10.1016/0304-3959(94)00215-Z.
6 – W.G. Dixon, A.L. Beukenhorst, B.B. Yimer, et al. How the weather affects the pain of citizen scientists using a smartphone app, NPJ Digit Med, 2 (2019).
7 – D. Steffens, C.G. Maher, Q. Li, et al. Effect of weather on back pain: results from a case-crossover study, Arthritis Care Res, 66 (12) (2014), pp. 1867-1872.
8- Quick DC: Joint pain and weather. A critical review of the literature. Minn Med. 1997, 80: 25-29.