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How Effective is Acupuncture in Treating Chronic Pain?
Studies show conflicting results about whether or not acupuncture can help people with chronic pain, but there is evidence that acupuncture works for some people and some types of pain. Even if, as some studies have found, the benefits of acupuncture are all in the head, those benefits could still be worth pursuing. After all,…
Read MoreYoga Can Treat Chronic Pain
Yoga can be helpful for people with chronic pain, just as it can be immensely helpful for people who are dealing with trauma. Chronic pain patients often suffer from trauma as well. Chronic pain is processed differently by the brain than acute pain. Chronic pain, as opposed to acute pain, recruits areas of the brain…
Read MoreEmpathy: An Overdue Prescription
Last week I discussed the phenomenon that, though more women experience pain than men, they are chronically undertreated. Ethnic minorities, including African Americans, are known to be undertreated as well. Not surprisingly, low-income patients experience the same disparity. One could point to subtle gender, class, and racial biases as the reason why such disparities exist.…
Read MoreWomen in Pain: What We Need to Know
As I put it in my book The Painful Truth, “Pain is an unbidden guest, humanity’s shadow companion down through the ages. It is an interloper, a despoiler of dreams, a thief.” The “thief,” however, does not treat all persons equally. Chronic pain affects one group of people more frequently than any other—women. A study…
Read MoreWhat’s Massachusetts Thinking?
What’s Massachusetts thinking? The newest twist in the painkiller abuse debate is that Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker has proposed legislation that has me in dejected disbelief. The bill would restrict both doctors and dentists from prescribing more than 72 hours of medication to patients upon initial injury or surgery. I understand the thought but it…
Read MorePendulums and Painkillers
Carl Jung once remarked, “The pendulum of the mind alternates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong.” When I think about the nation’s patchwork quilt policy toward opioids, I’m reminded of how right he was. In my book “The Painful Truth,” I devoted some space to outline a brief history of opioids, and…
Read MoreConfronting Mental Illness and Guns: What Should We Do?
In my column in Pain Medicine News this month, I talked about a tragic dual suicide attempt of a married couple I knew, both of whom suffered from chronic pain. From one standpoint, a story like this is as shocking as it is incomprehensible. From another perspective, it’s becoming another sad milepost in society–not unlike the rash…
Read MoreFighting Chronic Pain as a Teenager
Fighting Chronic Pain as a Teenager Chronic pain is almost always life altering, but it can be an especially difficult adjustment when it impacts someone whose life is just beginning. Ali Goldsmith was 14 when she started to feel the effects of chronic pain. After surgery to remove bunions, her pain worsened when her doctor…
Read MoreSuicide and Chronic Pain
Suicide and Chronic Pain Of all the consequences that accompany chronic pain, none other is as heartbreaking as suicide. While the physical impacts of pain are recognized and can often be improved, the stress associated with chronic pain, social stigma, and feelings of hopelessness can be overwhelming, sometimes leading a person to feel that life…
Read MoreWhy I Wrote “The Painful Truth”
Why I Wrote “The Painful Truth” People in pain have never been heard as legitimate patients. With more than 30 years of listening to heart wrenching stories of how people in pain are ignored and denigrated, I wanted to give them a voice. The scarcity of the public and medical understanding about pain has translated…
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