What is your approach to working with clients who have experienced injuries or chronic pain?

Question

Dr. Mitchell Tanner, PT, DPT, CSCS · Answer

What is your approach to working with clients who have experienced injuries or chronic pain? So, whenever an athlete has an injury, there is typically like an acute traumatic specific reason that they have pain or the injury is an overuse injury and it's easier to tease out specifically what it is you're trying to accomplish. And so typically with an acute injury, you want to allow that process, the pain signals to calm down and then you want to build back up function as just a general overview. With chronic pain, it is a little bit more complex just because there typically is an initial onset of pain that wasn't managed in a way that was helpful if the patient became fearful of that pain or if it's something that's severely impacting their life. There are many, many factors that can contribute to that prolonged pain experience and so it's important to lean into education for the patient so that they understand why they're experiencing the pain, the many factors that can contribute to it, and ultimately what the main ways they can control their pain experience are. So leaning into that education and helping them understand that the pain is normal and that we don't really have pain sensors. We have sensors for pressure, touch, temperature, stretch, tension, but no for pain. And whenever we experience any of those other sensations in a range that is outside of our normal experience, our brain interprets that as danger and we experience it as pain. That we gradually want to turn down that danger signal and eventually turn down that pain signal.

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"What is your approach to working with clients who have experienced injuries or chronic pain?"