It’s inevitable that you may have bruises on your body. Bruises can appear whenever you fall, having sport injuries or car accidents. It can also happens due to blows received from other object or when you interact with people. What is bruises? Basically these are area of skin discoloration. Bruises appear when small blood vessels got broken. As a result, it will leak their contents into soft tissue area beneath the skin. The areas are most likely get damaged due to hard hit with another objects.

In this article, we will give you brief explanation about 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly. Actually the bruises will fade eventually, but sometimes there are moments when you need to heal it quickly due to important events or the urgency to meet someone. Or else, you may consider these effective ways if the bruises appear in spotlight area, like on your face. Before talking about 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly, let’s dig deeper and know more about bruises.

Symptoms of Bruises

Actually we can easily detect the symptoms of bruises or hematoma. You will feel the pain, get swelling, drainage, fever, and the easiest way to notice bruises is by the discoloration of skin. The color will fade between 12 until 15 days. At the beginning it will be pinkish red, and change to bluish [1]. When your bruises turn blue, it most likely catch others’ attention. At the next phase, the color of bruises will be greenish-yellow. At this step, the color starts to fade. At the end, the bruises will change the skin color back to normal.

Types of Bruises

In general, we know bruises or contusion as the result of injury or falling. But there are 3 types of bruises that is classified according to the area where they appear [2]. The bruises are mostly appear in areas like thigh pads, hip guards, and elbow pads. So here are the types of bruises:

  • Subcutaneous

This is the type of bruises when they appear beneath the skin. This is the most common bruises experienced by everyone, from adult to kids. This is what we mentioned earlier as the bruises that will fade away automatically within 12 or 15 days.

  • Intramuscular

The word muscular in this type refers to the location of bruises. Intramuscular bruises appear within the belly of the underlying muscle. This is more complex than subcutaneous bruises and cause the affected person to feel pain much more than the regular bruises or subcutaneous.

  • Periosteal

The last type of bruises called periosteal. This is the most severe and painful bruises compared to the others, because they happen in the bone. Also called bone bruises, you need to contact medical staff or doctor immediately to handle this type of bruises.

What Make Bruises Easier to Appear?

Besides the things that trigger bruises to appear like falling or having injuries during sports, there are other things that make bruises easier to appear. If you are taking blood thinner like Aspirin, Warfarin or Dabigatran, the bruises will be more likely to appear. That’s why you need to know 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly. Not only for aesthetical reason, but also because bacteria may enter your wound if it’s not handled properly.

How to Prevent Bruises?

Before talking about 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly, there are some prevention steps that you may take to avoid having bruises. Or you can consider teaching this to your kids that are prone to experience falling and having bruises.

  • Teach your kids how to be safe

Or in this case, you can also consider to tell yourself to be more careful in doing the activities. When you are discussing about this with these little playful children, ask them to portray cause and effect situation. Explain to them that when you are not careful, it will result to injury and they will feel the pain. The final results are the bruises on their body.

  • Wear protection

This is important moreover when you are on the street. Wear helmet when you are on motorcycle. Also use the seatbelt when you are in a car. For the kids who like to ride bicycle around with their friends, make sure that they use proper protection things like helmet, knee and elbow pads.

  • Use proper sport equipment

There are so many benefits of doing sports. But if you are not careful, you may get injury that make you unable to do sports. So make sure that you have proper sport equipment and do sports in the areas provided. Take this prevention step easily to prevent injury and bruises.

15 Effective Ways to Heal Bruises Quickly

It will be great if you know how to deal with the bruises within 24 hours. The sooner, the better. What should you do? These 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly are worth-considering.

1. Pineapple

Do you like fruits? Then it’s an easy task to have pineapple as one of the effective ways to heal bruises quickly. Yes, the inside pineapple has strong ability [3]. It can reach the damaged blood vessels. What for? It will work to digest the protein that causes bruises and skin inflammation. So when you have bruises, make sure that you consume 500 milligrams of bromelain each day. This will help your bruises fade easily.

2. Papaya

Another fruit that comes as weapon to heal bruises quickly is papaya. This orange fruit contains papain enzyme that is a great thing to treat many skin problems. Papain is a powerful digestive aid [4]. It’s very easy to do this, just slice the papaya and apply it on your bruises for about 15 minutes. Repeat if necessary.

3. Grape Seed

It’s a common thing that grape seed is rich of flavonoid [5]. This ingredient can help to fasten the process of wound-healing. All you have to do is crush the grape seed so that you get the extract. Drink this twice a day so that your body will get enough flavonoid supply in delicious way.

4. Turmeric and Tamarind

There are so many benefits of herbs like turmeric and tamarind. Commonly found in South Asian countries, turmeric contains curcumin that has the ability to reduce soreness of your skin. While tamarind has powerful antioxidant ingredients and contains antimicrobial thing, which is also great [6]. Both of turmeric and tamarind work as therapeutic and medicinal properties to heal your bruises quickly. Not only that, these things also can help your wound-healing process as their role as bacterial agent. Simply mix and smoothen the turmeric and tamarind so they will become a paste. Apply on the bruises and let it stay for about 15 minutes. You can do this as many times as you want. Not only turmeric and tamarind, you can also use ginger to heal bruises quickly! Slice and soak ginger in hot water. After that, strain the water and drink it. Or else, you can just simply scrub the crushed ginger to your bruises.

5. Chocolate

Seems like the 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly include delicious stuffs, right? The next thing that can help you to heal the bruises is chocolate. The cocoa bio active compounds inside chocolate will work as anti-inflammatory property. By doing this, the bruises on your skin won’t be swollen. To have the effect, just melt the choco and apply it on bruised area. Cover it with bandage until it dry. The chocolate will compress the damaged blood vessels. But be very careful please, make sure that you are not applying it when the chocolate is too hot because it may hurt your skin.

6. Frozen Vegetables

Pick up the vegetables from your fridge. But for this time, you need to keep it in the freezer for around 15 minutes to have the frozen one. What for? The frozen vegetables can reduce blood clot. How to do it? Simply wrap the frozen vegetables with soft cotton towel. You can choose hard vegetables like cabbage to maintain the coolness. Other than frozen vegetables, you can also consider using stainless steel spoons. But first keep it inside the freezer to have the frozen spoons.

7. Hot Water Bottle

After doing the cool method, it’s time to try the hot one. But you can’t do cold and hot methods at the same time. Give gap for around 2 hours before you have extreme change of temperature. In doing this way, you just need to place hot water in a bottle. Make sure that the bottle is not dry, because bruises can be healed faster in moist condition rather than dry one. This way can reduce the blood clot or slow down the blood. Make sure that the temperature is consistent and warm, not too hot. The other way to do this effective way to heal bruises quickly is by having a relax time at the Jacuzzi [7].

8. Sugar or Honey

Both sugar and honey have antibacterial properties that can prevent the growth of bacteria. Remember previously we mentioned about the possibility of bacteria to enter your wound? Using sugar or honey, you can prevent it. How to do it? Simply make a hot sugar syrup, and tie it around your bruises. Make sure that the temperature is warm enough and not too hot. Let dry the syrup to tighten the skin and make sure that the bruises are not spreading.

9. Onion

It’s all in your kitchen. This time is for onion, who is known for its anti-inflammatory properties. Simply extract the onion and apply it on your bruises. Your skin will absorb and the onion works to block the blood vessels. This way also can help you to reduce the blood clot.

10. Cayenne

Cayenne pepper is known for its capsaicin ingredient. This works as pain reliever, including when you are having bruises. How to do it? Simply apply the cayenne pepper on your skin, and mix it with Vaseline to form a paste. Keep it for about 20 minutes. Wash it. You can repeat this way for a few times to have maximum result.

11. Butter

The butter also has the role to heal your bruises quickly. If some of you haven’t realize it yet, butter also has anti-inflammatory properties. And this method is so easy to do. Just apply fresh butter on your bruises and areas affected. Gently massage the butter to your skin.

12. Vinegar

Vinegar is known as effective liquids to cure skin problems. You’re right, the vinegar can drive away blood pooled in affected area. Just mix vinegar with warm water and compress it gently to your bruises. This will treat your blood clot instantly and make the wound-healing process faster.

13. Black Coffee

Grab your coffee grounds and grind it. Place the coffee powder on your bruises. Tie a bandage to make sure that it’s properly attached to your bruises. This way will control your blood leakage and speedy the healing process. Don’t forget to tie around the affected area in mild manner, not too tight and not too lose either [8].

14. Above the Heart

If possible, keep the bruised areas above the heart. This will keep blood from pooling to the tissue area beneath the skin. Also don’t treat it from top, and make sure that it’s not under the affected area. Not only that, you need to restrict moving around the areas with bruises too often. The more you make movement, the bigger possibility the bruises will spread. Do not over working muscles in the area for a few days. Do not continue running or playing because it will insult pain in the bruised areas of your body.

15. Ice Cubes

Similar like the hot water bottle way to heal bruises quickly, but this time you can use ice to heal the bruises faster and reduce swelling. To do this, just wrap ice cubes in a clean towel. You can also soak cotton cloth in ice cold water for 10 minutes. After that, place the ice cubes for 15 minutes, but no more than 20 minutes, and repeat it for every hour. It will be more effective if you do this way within 24 hours when you got the bruises. Remember, don’t apply the ice directly to the bruises  as it may hurt your skin [9].

Besides these 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly, please remember to not drain the bruises with needle. It may lead to infection and worse condition. Don’t ignore the pain and apply these effective ways to make sure that your bruised areas will fade quickly. If there are bruises on your skin without injury or fall, call health provider. If you feel extreme pressure and pain in a bruised part of your body, check it soon. The worst case of bruises is compartment syndrome. But as long as you can control the pain, you can consider to do these 15 effective ways to heal bruises quickly mentioned above.