Pain Management: A Definition
Pain management is the process of relieving pain and rehabilitating patients through various strategies. It is important to seek out the healthiest, most conservative forms of pain management while avoiding unnecessary surgeries (which are often prescribed for back pain patients) or the prolonged use of painkilling medications. While drug use is sometimes required, it is inadvisable to rely on drugs as a sole means of pain relief.
On a basic level, pain management usually includes some form of pharmacological intervention in addition to non-drug rehabilitation options such as physical therapy, acupuncture, massage therapy, or chiropractic care. Certain patients—those in extreme pain—may require injections of a long-lasting steroid or temporary anesthetic numbing agent. Generally speaking, such injections are employed so that patients may participate in programs of physical therapy.
