Pain management involves use of medications or other treatments to help patients reduce or better tolerate pain. It addresses the two major types of pain:

• Acute pain. Short-term pain often related to recent disease, inflammation, trauma or surgery.
  
  
• Chronic pain. Long-term and persistent pain. Causes include diseases, degenerative conditions, imbalance of the nervous system and incomplete healing after an injury. Examples include arthritis,  fibromyalgia, lupus and chronic fatigue syndrome .

Patients who develop significant pain often find that it overwhelms many aspects of their lives. The first step in treating acute and chronic pain is seeking medical care to diagnose the cause of the pain. Though a patient’s primary care physician can often diagnose and treat pain, some cases require the help of a physician with expertise in pain. These physicians, known as pain specialists, work with a patient to determine the best course of therapy to alleviate pain. Treatments include:

• Lifestyle improvements such as exercise, diet and weight loss
  
  
• Medications including analgesics and anti-inflammatories
  
  
• Therapies such as physical therapy, manipulation therapy, occupational therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy
  
  
• Modalities such as heat therapy, cold therapy, water therapy, ultrasound therapy and electrical therapy
  
  
• Injection therapy such as epidural corticosteroid injections, nerve blocks or facet joint injections
  
  
• Complementary and alternative treatments such as acupuncture and biofeedback
  
  
• Surgeries such as arthroscopy, arthroplasty, carpal tunnel release or spine surgery

Medical and technological advances have made pain more manageable today than ever before. However, in many instances chronic pain goes untreated, undertreated or mistreated.

It is important that patients seek care and do not give up until they have found an appropriate method of pain relief. Pain that goes untreated seriously affects a person’s quality of life and may worsen other health problems, delay recovery and interfere with healing.