I don’t watch a lot of TV but I did happen to spot this advert for Nurofen. Now I’m pretty sure that a couple of nurofen isn’t going to make a huge difference if you have a migraine but what this advert does show is how the physical structures in the head and neck affect headaches. Tension headaches and migraines are both related to physical issues – tension in the…
I’ve written a few times now about nerve pain and how it confuses treatment. The problems with nerve pain are: Identifying it Finding the root cause And this is why you can be having the best tennis/golfers elbow treatment, the best carpal tunnel treatment, the best knee and leg pain treatment with no effect. Because it’s actually a problem with the nerve supplying that area not that area itself. The…
“I have a vision . . . . a vision of your future . . . . . it’s a pain free future . . . . . ” Yes, yes, I know, it’s an old joke that I can predict your future with gait analysis. The studies show that it can predict your outcome after hip replacement surgery and now it turns out that it can predict your injury…
In my first post about chronic pain I explained the difference between chronic pain and acute pain and how pain functions in the body. In my second post I talked about central sensitization and how this complicates treatment for patients with chronic pain – making them, quite literally, feel more pain, more easily with less stimulation. So now I want to put this in a real life context. Knee Surgery…
Most of us are familiar with sciatica, when the discs in the lower spine (specifically L3) get compressed and start to press onto the sciatic nerve. This causes pain and tingling in the leg and buttock as well as leg weakness and pain into the foot. In fact sciatica is often used as a “catch all” term to describe all kinds of nerve issues coming from the lower back and…
In my first article about chronic pain I started to explain a little about why chronic pain is different and needs to be treated differently. I talked about the science behind it and how pain works. Now let’s start to put that into context of how chronic pain affects you and how it makes you feel. One of the terms we often use when talking about chronic pain is “central…
Neck pain, so much more than a pain in the neck! When I spoke about whiplash I mentioned some of the other conditions and symptoms which whiplash victims can also suffer from. And the reason why whiplash victims often end up with a whole laundry list of symptoms apparently unconnected to their neck? Every single nerve in the body travels through the neck. And every single action in the body,…
In the past I have jokingly referred to gait analysis as a way to predict the future. I can watch you walk, analyse your foot function and be pretty certain whether you will have hip, knee or ankle pain in the next decade. Foot function rarely alters, it gets worse but if you have high big toe impact at 18 the chances are you will continue to have high big…
A few years ago I was involved in a car accident – another driver didn’t see the red light and rear ended me. I became part of a growing statistic – a whiplash victim. Immediate and Short Term Symptoms stiffness and tenderness in the neck and upper back headaches dizziness pain into shoulders and arms difficulty turning your head Early Treatment The quicker you start treatment, the better. Use an…
What is Persistent Pain? The dictionary definition of chronic or persistent pain is “any pain that lasts longer than 12 weeks.” For many of my patients, by the time they come to see me, they have seen numerous therapists, tried many medications and even had surgeries, all with varying degrees of success. And those weeks have become months or years. Is Chronic Pain different? Yes. The difference lies in how…