Newsletter Index:
Page 1: Effective Approaches to Pain Management | Fibromyalgia and Pilates
Page 2: Breaking the Pain Cycle
Page 3: Multidisciplinary Functional Restoration Approach
Page 4: Acupuncture Provides Long-Term Relief of Low Back Pain

Much of what we feel depends on our interpretation of pain.

How can we help our chronic pain patients understand what’s happening to them? For them, the most obvious signal is the physical cause of the pain that acts as a stimulus. This stimulus is usually the original injury or source of the pain, which can be tissue damage, inflammation or disease, and traditionally becomes the focus of pain management and medical treatment.

In response to this stimulus, patients tense up their muscles to prevent the injured part from moving, bracing to prevent pain, and allowing for healing. However, while this is a reasonable short-term solution, this muscle tension itself soon becomes a source of pain because the muscles become overworked from chronic contraction. Further bracing causes pain to spread to adjacent muscles that also tense, creating a chain reaction. The Care Center treats these symptoms with traditional medical approaches, massage, stretching, biofeedback, relaxation techniques, meditation, and guided imagery.

Guided Imagery, distraction and meditation are essential pain management skills. with consistent practice, they become more and more effective.

Pain exists because we are aware of it. Distraction techniques are easy to teach our patients and provide effective short-term relief from pain by reducing or eliminating their experience of pain. Guided imagery and hypnosis are extremely useful, as is meditation which requires consistent practice. By helping patients become absorbed in images and create experiences without pain, patients form new relationships with their pain. This has to happen if we are to help them change their interpretation of pain.