Chronic pain, or persistent pain as it is now known, is defined as pain that persists beyond the normal healing timeframes. It is is a complex condition that goes beyond simple tissue ‘damage’ and is hugely multifaceted in nature, meaning it traditionally has been very complex to treat.
Pain itself is a very complicated thing. It can act as a warning system that your brain uses to guard you from damaging your body. But in persistent pain, it can be described as an overly sensitive warning system where even low-level stimuli that shouldn’t set it off, do set it off. Therefore, our aim is to work with you to ‘dial down’ the hyperactivity occurring within this system.
Common conditions that can lead to persistent pain:
- Neck and lower back pain
- Nerve-related pain
- Osteoarthritis
- Fibromyalgia
- Post-traumatic injury e.g post-car accident
- Post-surgery
- Headache and migraine
It is common to feel overwhelmed and lost when it comes to persistent pain. Physiotherapy is commonly used to help people in long-term pain to help improve their quality of life. It is important that treatment for persistent pain adopts a holistic approach, developing a treatment plan to help manage your condition and increase movement and function.
There are many ways in which physiotherapy can help with this. This can include:
- A personalised exercise programme. We have access to our own rehabilitation gym on site allowing a guided approach
- Pain education
- Advice on chunking and pacing activities throughout the day
- Fatigue management techniques
- Acupuncture
- Joint mobilisations
- Ultrasound-guided steroid injections
Our aim is to work with you, not on you. The combination of high-quality treatment in-clinic with appropriate self-management techniques helps to provide you with a sense of control over your pain, not your pain controlling you.
