WAUSAU, Wis. (WSAW) – From headaches to sore muscles, pain relievers like Tylenol and Ibuprofen are something you can usually find in anyone\u2019s medicine cabinet. <\/p>\n
After President Trump recently claimed a connection between the use of Tylenol and autism, some may be wondering which over-the-counter drug they should be using.<\/p>\n
There are two classes of medications that alleviate pain. Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs or NSAIDs, like ibuprofen, and Acetaminophen, like Tylenol.<\/p>\n
\u201cBoth go over the counter, and I think people can mix up about; they think they\u2019re equally effective,\u201d said Dr. Alaa Abd-Elsayed, UW Health\u2019s Pain Management Clinic\u2019s medical director.<\/p>\n
When you\u2019re taking a stroll down the medicine aisle at the grocery store, NSAIDs and Acetaminophen are two things that may jump out at you. These pain relievers have many uses, but do you know which one you should be taking?<\/p>\n
\u201cIf patients know they have an inflammatory condition, arthritis, probably patients know they have arthritis. I\u2019ll go more for NSAIDs, assuming no contraindications,\u201d Dr. Abd-Elsayed said. \u201cIf they have just general pain, headache, I will recommend going again, if no contraindication to the acetaminophen products, in low doses.\u201d<\/p>\n
He says it\u2019s important to know the appropriate doses and side effects for these medications.<\/p>\n
For people using NSAIDs, there\u2019s a risk of getting gastric ulcers, increased bleeding, renal failure, and a negative impact on the heart.<\/p>\n
Drugs taken for symptoms like headaches can have negative impacts if not used properly<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we come to acetaminophen, the biggest one is liver failure and damage, and have took care of patients who had complete liver failure because of using, for example, acetaminophen over the counter,\u201d said Dr. Abd-Elsayed.<\/p>\n
He says pain tells us something is happening in the body. Sometimes it\u2019s good to avoid taking over-the-counter medications because they could cause you to miss something dangerous. Instead, he encourages people to explore why they have the pain if it continues.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is bad that we feel pain, but it\u2019s a warning sign that people get diagnosed with cancer, headache conditions, all kinds of diseases. So, pain is a blessing,\u201d said Dr. Abd-Elsayed.<\/p>\n
He also advises not giving children the same pain relief you would give an adult. Instead, it\u2019s best to check the bottle for age restrictions and use an age-appropriate remedy.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 WSAW. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WAUSAU, Wis. (WSAW) – From headaches to sore muscles, pain relievers like Tylenol and Ibuprofen are something you…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":124752,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[274],"tags":[54490,18,135,19740,19,17,462,75653,69513,75654,57809,75652,54489,75657,75656,75655],"class_list":{"0":"post-124751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-acetaminophen","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-ibuprofen","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-medication","15":"tag-nonsteroidal-anti-inflammatory-drugs","16":"tag-nsaids","17":"tag-over-the-counter-medications","18":"tag-pain-relief","19":"tag-pain-relievers","20":"tag-tylenol","21":"tag-what-are-the-side-effects-of-acetaminophen","22":"tag-what-are-the-side-effects-of-nsaids","23":"tag-what-other-options-are-there-than-tylenol"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/124752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}