Acute or Chronic Pain

Acute pain is pain the comes suddenly and is caused by an injury or inflammation and can last for seconds or weeks. It tends to go away when the underlying cause goes away.

Acute pain is a warning bell or alarm in your body and brain, telling you there is something wrong and it makes you deal with it, like  to rest  or seek treatment.

This allows the cause of the pain to resolve and the acute pain will STOP.

Your body starts to heal and the pain resolves (normally in less than 3 months).

Chronic and Persisting Pain is pain which lasts for a longer period (greater than 3 months) and tends to persist beyond the normal healing time of the injury. Strangely, this type of pain can sometimes start spontaneously or can just persist after an injury and can have no obvious reason.

Chronic pain can even persist once your tissue has healed or repaired and your scans and X rays are normal! (see Patient Info Part 1  – use link).

Chronic or Persisting Pain is a problem with the Nervous System (Brain and Nerves) and often your Nervous System has become Hypersensitive (see Pain Management Patient Info Part 2 – use link).

If your Nervous System has become Hypersensitive,  simple things like bending, moving and touch can make your pain feel much worse.

Even your mood, emotions and stress can make your pain worse and you become “fearful” to move.

It is important to realise at this stage that pain is NOT  indicative of Tissue Damage, as often the injury has healed but pain persists. This is a new concept to many people who are in pain, but once you do understand this concept,  your recovery from Persistent Pain can be dramatic.

East Gosford Physiotherapy and Exercise Physiology will help you to start moving safely again, in a way that will NOT cause injury.

Unfortunately, NOT moving tends to make you stiffer and sorer and the fear of moving becomes worse than the movement itself (see Patient Info Part 3 – use link).

We will help you to understand your pain and what you can do to help it.

We will help you “re-connect” your Brain and Body with Neuroplasticity management principals, to help you to safely move again, even with pain, which surprisingly helps you to better manage your pain.

We will develop a PAIN MANAGEMENT PATHWAY, with gentle movement and education to manage your persisting pain with Neuroplasticity.

You will develop strength and endurance to get you back into life again!