Pain Management
What is Pain Management?
Despite enormous breakthroughs in medicine in recent years, chronic pain is a worldwide epidemic. Indeed, one of life's great ironies is that breakthroughs in medicine may possibly lead to chronic pain, as more people survive accidents and catastrophic illness. Chronic pain has also been linked to auto-immune illnesses, cancer, stress, and a variety of other ailments.
People suffering from chronic pain often experience enormous distress, both because of the pain itself, and because of the effect that it has on their quality of life. In some people no physical reason can be found for the pain they suffer, and they are doubly afflicted – by the pain and by the fact that they can be accused of malingering, or told that their problems are “all in their head”. In their efforts to control their pain, many sufferers find their world closing in on them, as they feel less and less able to deal with other people and the many challenges that life presents them.
Chronic Pain Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy cannot cure all pain or remove the source of it, but it may help sufferers manage their pain and their reactions to it considerably better. As a consequence, stress levels are lowered, which may help to greatly lessen pain, which is exacerbated by stress-related factors such as increased adrenaline levels, tight muscles, and so on.
Cognitive behavioral therapy may be a very effective way to treating chronic pain by assisting victims in identifying their feelings and reactions and focusing on modifying their behaviors and having a more positive attitude. They can learn how to develop stronger coping skills while also exploring a variety of self-help strategies such as mindfulness, meditation, and others.
Sufferers' natural pain relief response - the production of natural pain control chemicals in the brain – can be boosted by becoming more capable of controlling the painful emotions they experience surrounding their pain.
Psychotherapy for chronic pain issues can be used in conjunction with physical pain therapies such as surgery, medicine, cancer treatments, and other techniques. It can be beneficial when the patient and their medical adviser are aware of the source of the discomfort – and when they are not.