Patient Satisfaction With Chronic Pain Treatment
Introduction
Chronic pain is basically defined as a pain that lasts for a much longer period after the basic ailment has healed. In usual circumstances, chronic pain persists for 6 months or even longer and fails to respond to the normal modes of medication and treatment.
Research shows that almost 40% of the total population in the UK is likely to suffer from chronic pain in their life-time.
Chronic pain generally manifests itself in a series of ailment and disorders. The main amongst these include:
- Back pain
- Headaches
- Arthritis and other joint pain
- Migraines, and the like
Chronic Pain Treatment – Patient Satisfaction
There are a series of treatment options available for the treatment of chronic pain. The most significant and commonly accepted treatment methods can be divided into three categories, including:
- Pharmacological measures
- Non-pharmacological measures
- Surgical methods
Pharmacological methods generally include medications in terms of drugs, injections and topical applications used to provide relief from chronic pain that emanates from various disorders.
Meanwhile, non-pharmacological measures generally include alternative methods such as massage therapy, acupuncture, homeopathic medicine, chiropractic and many more. Lastly, surgical options include procedures like the knee replacement surgery that are carried out in situations when both of the above methods have failed to provide the desired pain-relief.
Research and Analysis
The entire treatment plan of chronic pain is aimed at two basic objectives, depending upon the individual situation, including:
- Treating the cause of pain
- Reducing/eliminating pain
In this section, we’ve discussed and explained the affectivity of treatment for both of these objectives.
Research largely shows that the quality of the result of chronic pain treatment considerably depends on the patient’s medical history and the particular disorder. A study conducted recently revealed that while a majority of patients showed remarkable improvement with different treatment methods, 10-13% of the population suffering from chronic pain showed negligible or no improvement at all.
A series of studies strongly indicates that patients who are given sufficient counseling sessions, combined with medications such as NSAIDs respond very well to the overall treatment. Since, the premise of pain is partially considered to be subjective, the treatment plan focuses heavily on patient education and awareness. In fact, individual case histories show that patients who shared a good rapport with their physicians showed a remarkable improvement, as compared to the other group.
Another study recently reported revealed that in a majority of cases of chronic pain, alternative therapies such as massage and even aromatherapy played a considerable role in providing relief.
Similarly, physiotherapy provided over 80% of chronic pain patients with adequate relief, owing to the basic fact that this mode of treatment stresses on the need for encouraging movement, restricting inactivity and performing physical exercises on a regular basis.
Lastly, as in the case of most of pain-related treatments, surgical methods show partial results in cases of chronic pain as well. The impact a surgical procedure has on the chronic pain mainly depends on the original cause of the pain. For instance, a survey showed that patients with chronic knee pain responded well to surgeries such as knee replacement surgery. However, in cases where such exact causes are not known, surgical intervention might not produce the desired satisfactory results.
