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What Causes Severe Leg Cramps After Waking Up?

Posted on Fri, 2 Jun 2017

Question: I have had food poisoning in the past but this was 18 hours of in and out of the bathroom. Once in bed, I got severe leg cramps and contorted leg muscles and toes. Pain like a knife right into the muscle that was cramped. Nothing seemed to help, hot bath, aspercream, biofreeze, etc. I have had 2 hip replacements and one hip reconstruction, after a bad hip recall. One a scale of 1 to 10, it was 20. I never want this again and have sworn off hamburgers. What can I do and prevent the severe cramping? Gayle

Answered by Dr. Prof. Kunal Saha (3 hours later)

Brief Answer:
Due to electrolyte imbalance

Detailed Answer:
Thanks for asking on HealthcareMagic.

I have gone carefully through your query and understand your concerns. It seems that your problems are due to electrolyte imbalance. Your food poisoning is likely to have resulted in loss of water and salts from your body. Unless the lost electrolytes are replenished, the body is in distress and is reflecting the same through the symptoms. You need to take plenty of juicy fruits like citrus fruits, and bananas since they contain plenty of potassium which should help in easing the muscles. You should also take plenty of fluids and ORS (oral rehydration solution) to drink.

Medicines like the ones mentioned will not help as they do not address the underlying issue.

Let me know if I could help further.

Regards

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Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar