Chronic Pain
Chronic pain is pain which lasts longer than three months. It's very common, affecting about one in five adults. When pain lasts longer than three months it goes beyond the time of normal tissue healing. There are a number of things that may cause pain to last this long.
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The pain may be being caused by some degenerative process, such as osteoarthritis
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It may be being caused by the way in which you're loading a certain structure due to your work and recreational tasks, coupled with your biomechanics.
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It may be centrally-driven pain, meaning your nervous system continues to be sensitised to feeling pain as though you've recently been injured, even after the injury has healed; or
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It may be due to any combination of these three factors.
It's common for sufferers of chronic pain to have had X-rays or other imaging. These can sometimes be useful, but often there is a poor correlation between imaging results and symptoms, so chronic pain sufferers need not be disheartened by scan results that show no abnormality, nor by scan results which show a number of issues.
Chronic pain can often be confusing and frustrating, but with a thorough assessment of the potential causes, our physiotherapists can help formulate a plan to treat and / or manage your condition.
