Chiropractic Treatment for Chronic Pain and Depression
Pain serves an important function in our lives. When you suffer an acute injury, pain warns you to stop the activity that is causing the injury and tells you to take care of the affected body part.
Chronic pain, on the other hand, persists for weeks, months, or even years. Some people, often older adults, suffer from chronic pain without any definable past injury or signs of body damage. The medical community is increasingly referring their patients with common chronic pain to their local chiropractor (Vida Chiropractic for those of you in Newark, NJ) for treatment. The most common medical doctor referrals to chiropractors include (but are not limited to) those suffering from headaches, lower back pain, and osteoarthritis.
What is the treatment for chronic pain and depression? The first step in coping with chronic pain is to determine its cause. Addressing the problem will help the pain subside. In other cases, especially when the pain is chronic, you should try to keep the chronic pain from being the entire focus of your life.
- Stay active and do not avoid activities that cause pain simply because they cause pain. The amount and type of activity should be directed by your doctor, so that activities that might actually cause more harm are avoided.
- Relaxation training, hypnosis, biofeedback, and guided imagery can help you cope with chronic pain. Cognitive therapy can also help patients recognize destructive patterns of emotion and behavior and help them modify or replace such behaviors and thoughts with more reasonable or supportive ones.
- Distraction (redirecting your attention away from chronic pain), imagery (going to your “happy place”), and dissociation (detaching yourself from the chronic pain) can be useful.
- Involving your family with your recovery may be quite helpful, according to recent scientific evidence.
Feel free to discuss these or other techniques with us here at Vida Chiropractic.
