When people are undergoing chronic pain management they want help stopping or relieving their pain symptoms. What they may not realize is that some pain medications can actually cause or increase the pain that they are using the medication to manage. That is why it is crucial for people undergoing chronic pain management to educate themselves and learn as much as possible about their chronic pain condition as well as the most effective treatment options.

For example many people experiencing frequent headaches, especially migraines, do not realize that the medication they are using can actually be increasing the frequency and even severity of their pain. The use of opiates to treat migraines can lead to an increased risk for what is called transformed migraines. Transformed migraines are chronic, daily headaches with a vascular quality—meaning that they are throbbing in nature.

As anyone who ever experienced a migraine headache knows it can be extremely debilitating. Unless a migraine sufferer goes to a treatment provider who understands appropriate treatment interventions for this condition, they can run the risk of unnecessary pain and suffering including transformed migraines or even potential prescription drug addiction. Many people are prescribed opiates even though they are not an FDA approved medication for migraine treatment.

The evolving need of people undergoing chronic pain management for safe, effective pain relief is driving research into new therapeutic modalities and fresh approaches to familiar treatments. New innovations involving both opioid and nonopioid pain modalities as well as nonpharmacological approaches are vital because some patients fail to achieve a good outcome with opioid therapy alone.

To learn about relapse prevention for people living with chronic pain and coexisting disorders, including addiction please check out my article Relapse Prevention for Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you are working with people udergoing chronic pain management and want to learn how to develop a plan for managing their chronic pain and coexisting psychological disorders including addiction effectively please go to our Publications page and check out my book the Managing Pain and Coexisting Disorders: Using the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To listen to a radio interview I did conducted by Mary Woods for her program One Hour at a Time please Click Here to go to this interview.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.

In 1996 I conducted research to begin developing the first clinical skills training for Addiction Free Pain Management® System. What I looked for was information on people who had chronic pain and co-existing addiction. What I found was disturbing. There was nothing there! What I did find was a large amount of data on people with addiction and an abundance of information about people who had chronic pain. But I couldn’t find anything that addressed someone who suffered with both conditions. What I did discover was the Addiction Pain Syndrome™ and below is a brief overview.

When someone develops an addictive disorder there are many identifiable symptoms, or negative consequences as a result of the addiction that impact them biologically, psychologically, socially and spiritually. During my research I surveyed addiction and pain programs to find out what happened to these people when they tried to seek help. What I discovered was when they went into an addiction treatment program—the addictive disorder zone—the entire focus was on the addictive disorder. Unfortunately, their pain was not adequately addressed. The addiction programs really struggled with what to do about the chronic pain.

When someone is living with chronic pain and it is not managed appropriately they develop a pain disorder that impacts them biologically, psychologically, socially, and spiritually. Some of these negative consequences are similar to those who develop an addictive disorder but they are different. Now if that person went into a pain clinic, the entire focus was on the chronic pain, the physiological or biological pain. On the other hand, the pain clinics struggled with what to do when people were acting out with the addiction.

Historically, pain disorders and addictive disorders have been treated as separate issues. Pain clinics have had great success in treating chronic pain conditions. Addiction treatment centers have also had success in treating addictive disorders. However, both modalities struggle when the patient is suffering from both conditions. Addiction treatment programs cover about a third of the problem (the Addictive Disorder zone) when dealing with a chronic pain patient. The pain clinics cover a different third of the problem (the Pain Disorder zone). Each of those modalities misses about two thirds of the problem.

Sometimes addiction treatment centers recognize the need to refer a patient to a pain specialist or the pain clinics refer a patient to a chemical dependency specialist. This is definitely an improvement. Now about two thirds of the patient’s needs are being addressed (both the Addictive Disorder zone and the Pain Disorder zone). But what about the third zone?

This is the Addiction Pain Syndrome™ zone. This is why we developed the Addiction-Free Pain Management® (APM) System. This system addresses the addictive disorder, the pain disorder, and the addiction pain syndrome. All three zones are addressed—The Addictive Disorder zone, the Pain Disorder zone, and the Addiction Pain Syndrome zone.

To learn more about effective chronic pain management check out my article The Need for Multidisciplinary Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you are working with people undergoing chronic pain management and want to learn how to develop a plan for managing their chronic pain and coexisting psychological disorders; including depression, addiction and other coexisting psychological disorders effectively; please consider my book Managing Pain and Coexisting Disorders: Using the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.

This week I’m working with Terry Gorski to present his 44 Hour Relapse Prevention Therapy Certification School. Our participants represent many different modalities including military, drug treatment courts, faith-based programs, and other traditional addiction treatment programs. This training is designed to train our participants to help break a chronic relapse cycle that impacts as many as a third to a half of all recovering people.

This 44 hour advanced clinical skills training is designed for professional clinicians who are good and want to get better. At this training our participants are being challenged to take their current clinical skills and integrate them with new and powerful approaches for teaching clients to identify and manage high risk situations that lead to relapse in the critical first months of recovery.

The training is not easy, but most of our past students describe it as a major turning point in their professional and personal lives. Our participants are working hard. They will go home tired, but it will be a good tired. They will leave this training better prepared to make a difference in the lives of their patients and their families.

Certification as a Relapse Prevention Specialist has proven helpful to many of our graduates. There is a strong demand for new relapse prevention programs. The professionals most qualified to run these programs are Certified Relapse Prevention Specialists. As a result, many of our graduates have become supervisors of relapse prevention programs or private practitioners specializing in relapse prevention.

To learn about relapse prevention for people living with chronic pain and coexisting disorders, including addiction please check out my article Relapse Prevention for Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you are working with people udergoing chronic pain management and want to learn how to develop a plan for managing their chronic pain and coexisting psychological disorders including addiction effectively please go to our Publications page and check out my book the Managing Pain and Coexisting Disorders: Using the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To listen to a radio interview I did conducted by Mary Woods for her program One Hour at a Time please Click Here to go to this interview.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.