What is the reason for hamstring twitching

Many people have experienced twitching hamstrings, especially when sleeping in the early morning. The pain in the calf tendons can wake you up directly. Many people believe that calf muscle twitching is a symptom caused by calcium deficiency in the human body, so timely calcium supplementation can effectively prevent the occurrence of this symptom. But in addition to calcium deficiency, there are several other causes of hamstring twitching.

A cramp is a muscle spasm. Frequent leg cramps are mostly caused by calcium deficiency, cold, and local nerve and blood vessel compression. You can take an appropriate amount of calcium supplements, get more sun exposure, keep local warm, and also pay attention to changes in body position, such as sitting and sleeping positions, to avoid compression of nerves and blood vessels. You can also apply hot compresses and massage local muscles to enhance local blood circulation. If there is no improvement, you should go to the hospital for examination and treatment.

High fever, epilepsy, tetanus, rabies, calcium deficiency, etc. can all cause cramps, which are systemic. There are also local ones such as gastrocnemius (commonly known as calf) cramps, which are often caused by rapid exercise, work fatigue, or severe twisting of the tibia, and often occur when lying down or sleeping.

Common causes of leg cramps

Bad sleeping posture, such as lying on your back for a long time with the quilt pressing on the soles of your feet, or lying on your stomach for a long time with the soles of your feet against the bed, forces certain calf muscles to be in an absolutely relaxed state for a long time, causing "passive contracture" of the muscles.

Fatigue, lack of sleep, rest or excessive rest can lead to accumulation of local acidic metabolic products and cause muscle cramps. Walking or exercising for too long, which causes excessive fatigue in the lower limbs, or lack of rest and sleep, can cause lactic acid accumulation. Sleeping and resting too much or too long can slow down blood circulation and cause carbon dioxide accumulation. Cold stimulation from the external environment, such as low room temperature at night in winter, using a quilt that is too thin during sleep, or exposing legs and feet outside the quilt.

Prevention methods

1. Exercise regularly to prevent muscle fatigue. Do adequate warm-up exercises before exercise and stretch the muscles of your legs, waist, back, neck and arms. Do not increase the amount of exercise too quickly, and you should follow the principle of increasing it by 10% every week.

2. Drink water frequently, don’t wait until you are thirsty to drink. When sweating profusely, you should supplement with nutritionally fortified sports drinks.

3. Pay attention to dietary balance, especially supplementing various essential nutrients from the diet. For example: drinking milk and soy milk can supplement calcium; eating vegetables and fruits can supplement various trace elements.

4. Pregnant women should change their body posture frequently, move around every hour or so, wash their feet and calves with warm water before going to bed, and supplement nutrients including calcium according to the special needs of the body.

5. People who suffer from cramps at night should pay special attention to keeping warm. You may try stretching your muscles before going to bed, especially the muscles that are prone to cramps.