I’m in Florida this week helping my colleague, and Mentor, Terence Gorski conduct a 44 hour Relapse Prevention Therapy (RPT) Certification School.  We have about 40 participants from the addiction and mental health fields at this event and many of them shared that one of their biggest challenges, as well as a very common relapse issue, is working with people who have chronic pain and addiction issues.

It is very exciting to me to see that people from all over the US are taking the problem of chronic pain and addiction more seriously, and are letting go of judgments about people in recovery who NEED to be on APPROPRIATE medication.  There are two major relapse triggers for someone in recovery for any addictive disorder that also has chronic pain; one obvious trigger is using the “wrong” medication or taking too much of the “right” medication, and the second trigger is not learning more appropriate ways to manage their pain effectively.

As any of you who have looked at other parts of my website know; my philosophy is effective chronic pain management includes a multidisciplinary three part approach.  (1) appropriate medication management in collaboration with an addiction medicine specialist; (2) development of a nonpharmacological treatment plan; and (3) managing the psychological/emotional components of pain using cognitive behavioral and rational emotive therapy interventions.  Effective chronic pain management is possible if people are willing to implement this type of approach.  To read my free download article, Treating People in Chronic Pain, please go to the link below.

http://www.addiction-free.com/articles/articles/view/treating-people-in-chronic-pain