Differences Between Chronic Pain and Acute Pain

Answer:

Why does that hurt? What is pain? Where does it come from? Will it ever stop? These seem like simple and easy questions. Sometimes there are simple and easy answers for can be fixed and treated. Other times, pain can be terribly complex and long lasting. The more you understand your pain, the better your chances of curing it or reducing it.

A simple definition of pain is when certain nerve receptors in the body detect some sort of trauma or damage. Those nerves then send signals across our nervous system back to our brains where the signals get interpreted as pain.

One example is getting burned when you touch a hot stove. The nerves send a message to the brain, which causes a quick reflex, and then our brains send the interpretation of pain back to our hand.

We feel pain in so many different ways. We can feel it burning, tingling, sharp, dull, aching, throbbing, squeezing, just to name a few. Because there are so many different types of pain and so many variations on how each of us experience this pain, it can be challenging for doctors to diagnose where the pain is coming from.

Sometimes an injury is straightforward and relatively simple, such as a sprained wrist, a bump on the head, or a cut on a finger. Such simple injuries are called acute injuries. Acute pain tends to come on quickly and be intense and painful, but acute injuries are usually easily treatable. Our bodies heal fairly quickly from these types of injuries, over a period of days or weeks.

Other times, pain can come from more complex conditions, like arthritis, migraine headaches, or chronic nerve damage. These bring us long-term chronic pain. Chronic pain lasts for months or years. For some people, for the rest of their lives.

Chronic pain can be severe or mild, and it can be harder to treat or control. If you’re having pain issues that you think may have been caused by someone else, I’d like to talk to you about it. Give me a call and let’s chat.