Chronic Pain Management
Pain may be defined as an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage.
Pain becomes chronic pain when that pain does not heal even if normal remedies are applied and which stays for more than 3 to 6 months. Chronic pain persists, refuses to go away. It is defined as pain that either persists beyond the point that healing would be expected to be complete (usually taken as 3-6 months). Throughout the world, 1 in 5 people suffer from moderate to severe chronic pain. Chronic pain feel like slow torture, making difficult for you to go to work ,exercise, or even take a shower and dress yourself. Chronic pain can drain your ability to work, enjoy life and can be active. It can affect all aspects of your life including work , leisure , sexual life, social life, sleep, recreation, travel etc. Chronic pain can be intense and unrelenting and lead to various degrees of disability if it is not managed well.
One person may have two or more co-existing chronic pain conditions also. Chronic pain can range from mild to severe. It can be continuous or intermittent. It can be range from a dull ache, throbbing pain, shooting pain, burning pain, squeezing pain, stinging pain, stiff pain, sore pain etc. Emotional effects of chronic pain include depression, anger, anxiety.
According to the American Academy of pain medicine, more than 1.5 billion people around the world have chronic pain. It is the most common cause of long term disability in the US, affecting about 100 million Americans.
It often starts with an injury or painful condition such as
- Arthritis or other joint diseases
- Back pain, Neck pain
- Head aches
- Muscle sprain and strains
- Repetitive stress injuries
- Fibromyalgia
- Nerve damage
- Lyme disease
- Inflammatory bowel diseases
- Irritable bowel syndrome
- Endometriosis
- Surgery
- Cancer
- Some viral, bacterial or other type of infections
About 25% of people with chronic pain will go on to develop a condition called Chronic Pain Syndrome (CPS). Doctors don’t know exactly what causes CPS pain syndrome. CPS is a common problem that present a major challenge to health care providers because of its complex character, unclear causes and poor response to therapy.
The emotional component of the pain is called suffering. Pain is familiar to everyone and yet it is so complex and subjective that it cannot be easily described or treated. Estimated costs for treating chronic pain both directly and indirectly are close to 50 billion USD a year.
Researchers have demonstrated that disability is as likely in the chronic pain population as it is in those with kidney failure, emphysema or stroke. This is the reality for 11 million US adults with High Impact Chronic Pain (HICP)
A substantial portion of the chronic pain population experience progressive deterioration in mental and physical health also along with substantially higher health care usage. About 83% of people with HICP were unable to work for a living and one-third had difficulty with self-care activities such as wasting themselves and getting dressed.
Ayurvedic management of Chronic pain
- 1. Lepanam
- 2. Swedanam
- 3. Pachanam
- 4. Sophaharam
- 5. Rakthamoksham
- 6. Abhyangam
- 7. Veshtanam
- 8. Anulomanam
- 9. Ropanam
- 10. Vasthi