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Best Ways to Deal with Chronic Pain

Everyone faces occasional aches and pains. The immediate reaction to a possible injury is generally the pain. Simply explaining, pain is the signal which travels from the injured area up through the spinal cord to your brain. But the injury-pain heels with time and medicine. That is certainly not the case with chronic pain. It remains, as if forever, even after the injury is healed. It makes it extremely difficult to go through the daily life activities.

Best Ways to Deal with Chronic Pain

Going by the definition, chronic pain is the one which lasts for more than 12 weeks. the feel could be a sharp or dull pain, causing an aching or burning sensation in the affected areas. It could be a continuous steady pain or intermittent suffering. Apparently, it might not have any reason what is causing the pain and can affect any part of the body.

The most common chronic pain examples are:

  • headache
  • arthritis pain
  • postsurgical pain
  • lower back pain
  • post-trauma pain
  • neurogenic pain
  • psychogenic pain

What might start as a casual injury can lead to severe back or muscle pull pain, which might become the chronic pain with the nerve damage.  Although chronic pain at any age makes it difficult to survive with the regular tasks, the most affected are the older adults. The severity and frequency of chronic pain vary from individuals. With a proper pain management, it can be possible to control the chronic pain, if not eradicate it completely. Here are some of the effective chronic pain management tips.

Chronic pain management tips without drugs

  • Medications aren’t the only solution but have other approaches too when dealing with chronic pain.
  • Exercising is a good habit irrespective of age, gender or physical condition, for those suffering from chronic pain, get help from the trained health providers and see what suits you the best. Practise them regularly to keep up the health condition. Correct exercise postures along with enough food and sleep can keep the chronic pain away for a long time.
  • Acupuncture is possibly one of the oldest chronic pain management tips. This age-old Chinese practice has been acclaimed worldwide and involves the use of tiny needles. These needles, when placed at specific points along the body can reduce the pain.
  • To get therapeutic benefits, massage is one of the most gentle yet effective chronic pain management tips. It helps to relax the muscles and sore tissues and eventually ease the chronic pain. When done rightly, the benefits of massage can relieve chronic lower back pain for more than six months.
  • Physical therapy should be done under the supervision of trained personnel. It teaches you how to stretch and move the muscles of the affected place. Unlike medication, it can alleviate the pain by actually treating the underlying source of the pain. Be it arthritis or another condition, the chronic pain can improve with time. One of the sub-parts of this method is water therapy where the muscles are worked under pool or whirlpool.
  • Hot and cold therapy is also useful and a proved method to reduce chronic pain. Heat therapy boosts blood flow to the affected areas and works best where there is any inflammation. Using heat wrap or heating pad, or even a bath in a lukewarm can give some relief to the chronic pain. Cold therapy, on the other hand, helps to slow down the blood flow to the inception point of the pain and reduce the swell eventually. Apply ice, a cold wrap, or a cold pack to the flaring joint pain and you will get effective results.
  • In the urban age, stress is one of the most unseen yet painful things to deal with. If not handled in time, it can lead to behavioral disorders. Depression can also aggravate chronic pain. Cognitive-behavioural therapy is thus one of the most eminent ways to deal with the psychological pain. It helps to manage thoughts and feelings along with the physical response. Biofeedback is another method which can control body’s reactions to pain. Hypnosis is also rare but sometimes practiced to relax pain.
  • TENS Treatment is one of the advanced methods used to deal with chronic pain management. It electrically stimulates the area where the pain is localized. This is done with transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation. It has a small device attached to the skin which ignites signals and sends to the injured area causing a reduction in pain or swollenness.
  • Distraction  is one of the most effective procedures which is often said to work the best! Even if you are consulting the best of the doctors and physiotherapists, unless you can involve yourself in some form of work or hobby, the brain, for the lack of any other focus will concentrate on the pain making it seem acute. It is important for the patient to keep themselves busy in something they like to do. Concentrating on visually smoothening scenic imageries also help to distract from the pain.
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