Understanding Chronic Pain

Pain is a very complex and subjective experience. To complicate the matter of pain even more, there are about 100 million people suffering from chronic pain in the US alone. This is about 1 in 4 people have a severe and debilitating pain condition. Some people have a high pain tolerance and others quite low. This makes treating pain even more complicated for medical professionals. Doctors don’t want you to suffer, thus end up prescribing stronger and stronger narcotic (addictive) medications to help you. Even following doctors orders can lead to problems. Over time, all of these medications fail to provide relief.

It might be helpful to understand the different types of pain because treatment methods vary greatly based upon the type of pain experience. For example, in the acute pain phase, painkillers such as Vicodin, Percocet, Hydrocodone are typically prescribed and are very effective. With chronic pain conditions, when the pain continues after an expected time of healing, painkillers are typically increased in both amount and frequency leading to problems with overuse and addiction. These “painkillers” no longer “kill” the pain and become less effective over time, so without other means of relief from the pain, addiction is inevitable. In fact, in 2016 in the US, death from overdose of painkillers is now the leading cause of death with an average of 47 deaths per day.

Acute pain, which is the time from injury to about 3 months,
Chronic Pain, which extends beyond a 3-6 month window of duration,
Chronic Pain Syndrome, which is pain which continues beyond 6 months.

Hope is at hand. There are programs, methods and help available to manage chronic pain. Multidisciplinary pain programs which incorporate psychology, medicine, chiropractic methods, acupuncture, massage, mindfulness meditation, mental imagery, biofeedback, hypnosis, cognitive restructuring have proven to be extremely effective in managing chronic pain. The mind is very powerful and can be harnessed to decrease, distract and transform the pain experience. You don’t have to continue to suffer. Click on the link below in blue to view an educational and informative video to help you understand how to help yourself manage your pain. Please call if you would like to know where to get help with your pain when you feel you are in need of help.
Video on understanding chronic pain...informative video about pain.

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