EMERGENCY PAIN RELIEF
Pain is a distressing feeling often caused by intense or damaging stimuli. It is widely defined as an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage. In medical diagnosis, pain is regarded as a symptom of an underlying condition.
Pain motivates an individual to withdraw from damaging situations or to protect a damaged body part while it heals. Normally, pain resolves once the noxious stimulus is removed and the body has healed. However pain may persist despite the removal of the stimulus and an apparent healing of the body. The truth is, pain can arise in the absence of any detectable stimulus, damage or disease.
Pain is the major symptom in many medical conditions, and can interfere with a person's quality of life and general functioning. Psychological factors such as social support, hypnotic suggestion, cognitive behavioral therapy, excitement, or distraction can affect pain's intensity or unpleasantness. In some cases, pain has been used as an argument to permit people who are terminally ill to end their lives.
Pain is usually transitory, as it lasts only until the harmful stimulus is removed or the underlying damage or pathology has healed, however some painful conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis, peripheral neuropathy, cancer and idiopathic pain, may persist for years.
If it lasts for a long time, pain is referred to chronic or persistent, whilst pain that resolves quickly is called acute. Traditionally, the distinction between acute and chronic pain has relied upon an arbitrary interval of time between onset and resolution; the two most commonly used markers are 3 and 6 months from the onset of pain.
TYPES OF PAIN
Understanding the different types of pain can make it easier for you to talk to your doctor and describe your symptoms. Some of the main types of pain and how they feel.
- Allodynia: Pain experienced in response to a normally painless stimulus. Read More
- Phantom pain: Pain felt in a part of the body that has been amputated, or from which the brain no longer receives signals. Read More
- Breakthrough pain: Transitory pain that comes on suddenly and is not alleviated by the patient's regular pain management. Read More
- Acute pain: Often begins suddenly and feels very sharp. It can be caused by many different things, such as an operation, a broken bone or an infection. Most acute pain go away when the reason for the pain has been treated. Read More
- Chronic pain: Pain that lasts for more than six months, even after the original injury has healed, is considered chronic. Read More
- Soft tissue (Visceral) Pain: This is pain that is felt when the organs, muscles or tissues are damaged, injured or inflamed. An example is when the liver becomes enlarged, causing pain and discomfort in the abdomen. Read More
- Neuropathic (Nerve) pain: This is pain caused by nerve damage. It may be due to cancer or cancer treatments. The pain can often continue even when cancer treatment has finished. It may be described as burning, shooting or tingling. Read More
- Referred pain: This is when pain from an internal organ can be felt in a different part of the body. E.g. pain from an enlarged liver might cause pain in the right shoulder. This may happen because pain messages from the liver travel along the same nerve pathways as messages from the skin. The brain confuses them and thinks the pain is coming from a different place. Read More
- Nociceptive pain: The most common type of pain. It’s caused by stimulation of nociceptors, which are pain receptors for tissue injury. Read More
There are many different conditions or injuries which cause pain, ranging from mild to severe and from chronic to acute. Everybody reacts differently to pain and feels it differently. Pain, however severe can be managed by following our doctors’ expert advice. How long pain medications will be taken will depend on the precise condition or injury as well as the patient.
The best way to manage pain is to keep “on top” of or ahead of it. This will mean taking regular medications at the onset of pain and then reducing them as needed. Analgesia (Balanced pain management) uses two or more medications that act in different ways to achieve a superior effect without increasing side effects (adverse events).
