1. Learn deep breathing or meditation to help with chronic pain.
Deep breathing and meditation are techniques that help your body relax, which eases pain. Tension and tightness seep from muscles as they receive a quiet message to relax.
Although there are many to meditate, the soothing power of repetition is at the heart of some forms of meditation. Focusing on the breath, ignoring thoughts, and repeating a word or phrase -- a mantra -- causes the body to relax. While you can learn meditation on your own, it helps to take a class.
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Deep breathing is also a relaxation technique. Find a quiet location, a comfortable body position, and block out distracting thoughts. Then, imagine a spot just below your navel. Breathe into that spot, filling your abdomen with air. Let the air fill you from the abdomen up, then let it out, like deflating a balloon.
2. Reduce stress in your life. Stress intensifies chronic pain.
Negative feelings like depression, anxiety, stress, and anger can increase the body's sensitivity to pain. By learning to take control of stress, you may find some relief from chronic pain.
Several techniques can help reduce stress and promote relaxation. Listening to soothing, calming music can lift your mood -- and make living with chronic pain more bearable. There are even specially designed relaxation tapes or CDs for this. Mental imagery relaxation (also called guided imagery) is a form of mental escape that can help you feel peaceful. It involves creating calming, peaceful images in your mind. Progressive muscle relaxation is another technique that promotes relaxation.
3. Boost chronic pain relief with the natural endorphins from exercise.
Endorphins are brain chemicals that help improve your mood while also blocking pain signals. Exercise has another pain-reducing effect -- it strengthens muscles, helping prevent re-injury and further pain. Plus, exercise can help keep your weight down, reduce heart disease risk, and control blood sugar levels -- especially important if you have diabetes. Ask your doctor for an exercise routine that is right for you. If you have certain health conditions, like diabetic neuropathy, you will need to be careful about the types of activities you engage in; your doctor can advise you on the best physical activities for you.
4. Cut back on alcohol, which can worsen sleep problems.
Pain makes sleep difficult, and alcohol can make sleep problems worse. If you're living with chronic pain, drinking less or no alcohol can improve your quality of life.
5. Join a support group. Meet others living with chronic pain.
When you're with people who have chronic pain and understand what you're going through, you feel less alone. You also benefit from their wisdom in coping with the pain.
Also, consider meeting with a mental health professional. Anyone can develop depression if they're living with chronic pain. Getting counseling can help you learn to cope better and help you avoid negative thoughts that make pain worse -- so you have a healthier attitude. Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.
6. Don't smoke. It can worsen chronic pain.
Smoking can worsen painful circulation problems and increase risk of heart disease and cancer.
7. Track your pain level and activities every day.
To effectively treat your pain, your doctor needs to know how you've been feeling between visits. Keeping a log or journal of your daily "pain score" will help you track your pain. At the end of each day, note your pain level on the 1 to 10 pain scale. Also, note what activities you did that day. Take this log book to every doctor visit -- to give your doctor a good understanding of how you're living with chronic pain and your physical functioning level.
My link to free pain diary:
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/30680755/Pain-Diary-Worksheet
And a second one:
http://www.painknowledge.org/physiciantools/PALogB698/PainandActivityLog_B698_FINAL.pdf
8. Learn biofeedback to decrease pain severity.
Through biofeedback, it's possible to consciously control various body functions. It may sound like science fiction, but there is good evidence that biofeedback works -- and that it's not hard to master.
Here's how it works: You wear sensors that let you "hear" or "see" certain bodily functions like pulse, digestion, body temperature, and muscle tension. The squiggly lines and/or beeps on the attached monitors reflect what's going on inside your body. Then you learn to control those squiggles and beeps. After a few sessions, your mind has trained your biological system to learn the skills.
9. Get a massage for chronic pain relief.
Massage can help reduce stress and relieve tension -- and is being used by people living with all sorts of chronic pain, including back and neck pain.
10. Eat a healthy diet if you're living with chronic pain.
A well-balanced diet is important in many ways -- aiding your digestive process, reducing heart disease risk, keeping weight under control, and improving blood sugar levels. To eat a low-fat, low-sodium diet, choose from these: fresh fruits and vegetables; cooked dried beans and peas; whole-grain breads and cereals; low-fat cheese, milk, and yogurt; and lean meats.
11. Find ways to distract yourself from pain so you enjoy life more.
When you focus on pain, it makes it worse rather than better. Instead, find something you like doing -- an activity that keeps you busy and thinking about things besides your pain. You might not be able to avoid pain, but you can take control of your life.
http://www.webmd.com/pain-management/11-tips-for-living-with-chronic-pain
Showing posts with label pain diary. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pain diary. Show all posts
Monday, January 23, 2012
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Why It's Important to Keep a Pain Diary
Why It's Important to Keep a Pain Diary and resources to keep track of it. Both old fashion and phone apps.
Your doctor needs detailed data to plot out the causes and triggers of your chronic pain and build a treatment plan. When she asks how you have been in the past month or two, you need to be ready to provide specifics.
"My back is bothering me worse than ever" won't help your doctor. One solution pain doctors recommend is keeping a pain diary, a consistent record of your pain experience.
Your doctor will be looking for triggers, stresses, and patterns. The more detailed you can be about the factors that seem to influence your pain, the better.
"My back is bothering me worse than ever" won't help your doctor. One solution pain doctors recommend is keeping a pain diary, a consistent record of your pain experience.
Your doctor will be looking for triggers, stresses, and patterns. The more detailed you can be about the factors that seem to influence your pain, the better.
- Rate your pain on the pain scale at different times of the day.
- Indicate whether your pain interrupts daily activities like walking, working, or sleeping.
- Note what meds you took, when you took them, how much relief they provided, and for how long.
- Describe other treatments you may have tried (yoga, herbal remedies,nonprescription drugs), and whether they provided any relief.
- Note any side effects of pain medicine.
- Keep track of anything that makes the pain improve (better when you are sitting instead of standing, better after a hot shower, etc.)
Watch for surprises and patterns
You may notice some unusual connections. The stress of making dinner in the evening may cause that stabbing pain to return, or an argument with your daughter may make your back hurt more than usual.
Andrea Cooper, 52, of Phoenix, Md., has found her pain diary invaluable for keeping track of her fibromyalgia. "I saw that my pain would peak at certain times of the day," she says. "Even when I was on pain medication, I still found the pain had an upward climb at the end of day. I was able to take that to the doctor, and when he looked at it he said 'Gee whiz, your pain medicine is not getting you through the day. We need to do something about that spike.' He changed my medication and things improved."
Don't get addicted to the pain diary
Cooper does warn, however, of the danger of focusing so much on your pain that you obsessively fill in an entry every hour of the day. "That can backfire," she says, because "we all know that focusing on something that's bothering us will make it worse."
Cooper takes quick notes during the day and then writes a longer entry at the end of the day.
Download a pain diary
The not-for-profit American Pain Foundation has an excellent pain notebook that you can download for free. Also check out our print-and-carry list of what to keep in your pain diary.
You may notice some unusual connections. The stress of making dinner in the evening may cause that stabbing pain to return, or an argument with your daughter may make your back hurt more than usual.
Andrea Cooper, 52, of Phoenix, Md., has found her pain diary invaluable for keeping track of her fibromyalgia. "I saw that my pain would peak at certain times of the day," she says. "Even when I was on pain medication, I still found the pain had an upward climb at the end of day. I was able to take that to the doctor, and when he looked at it he said 'Gee whiz, your pain medicine is not getting you through the day. We need to do something about that spike.' He changed my medication and things improved."
Don't get addicted to the pain diary
Cooper does warn, however, of the danger of focusing so much on your pain that you obsessively fill in an entry every hour of the day. "That can backfire," she says, because "we all know that focusing on something that's bothering us will make it worse."
Cooper takes quick notes during the day and then writes a longer entry at the end of the day.
Download a pain diary
The not-for-profit American Pain Foundation has an excellent pain notebook that you can download for free. Also check out our print-and-carry list of what to keep in your pain diary.
Other recourses for pain dairy's:
iPhone or iPad Apps to track your pain:
This is my favorite app. You can do SO much with it and even send the data to yourself or your doctor in spreadsheets. It's amazing! I use the free one. Not sure what the paid one has in addition.
More info about app here: http://www.chronicstimulation.com/index_files/PainTracker.htm?gclid=CIyz--Gd2agCFYjsKgodtkQXEQ
Here's another favorite:
One more also has reports and tracking for long term for your doctor:
I don't have an Android, but here are some apps I found that look pretty good:
Pain care as mentioned above on iPhone apps but for Droid:
Symptom Tracker Pro:
Hope these tools are useful. Do what works for you. Good luck!
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