#chronic-pain

#chronic-pain

Suicide is a cause of death that haunts the living in perpetuity. After a suicide event, those left behind are tormented by questions. "Could I have done something?" "What did I miss?" "How could this happen?" "Was it my fault?" Even the best answers fail to return the person lost, and natural grief is often compounded with unnecessary blame. Discussions about suicide prediction and prevention primarily focus on known risk factors such as mental illness and suicidal ideation. 1

Low back pain is the most common and debilitating of all pain complaints. Heavy lifting can cause it, but so can sitting at a desk all day, especially if you have bad posture and poor back support. Think hunching over a laptop at your dining table. Most times, an acute injury causing lower back pain will get better on its own in a matter of weeks. But it also can become a more lasting problem, especially as you age. Now some new science suggests one reason for this could be that we've been approaching the inflammation that comes with back pain all wrong.

When you have an acute injury, your body is sending signals through the peripheral and central nervous systems and the immune system to say, hold on, I need to stop doing this so we can allow the tissue to heal, says Ericka Merriwether, a physical therapist and pain researcher at New York University. Rest, after all, is the first part of the familiar RICE therapy, which stands for rest, ice, compression and elevation.

In March I started experiencing excruciating pain in my right arm and shoulder burning, zapping, energy-sapping pain that left me unable to think straight, emanating from a nexus of torment behind my shoulder blade and sometimes stretching all the way up to the base of my skull and all the way down into my fingers. Typing was agony, but everything was painful; even at rest it was horrible.

One day my left foot hurt for no good reason. I stood up to shake off the pain and tweaked my right Achilles tendon, so I headed for the medicine cabinet, bent over like an ape because of a stiff back. Actually, I lied. It wasn't one day. It's pretty much every day.

When living with chronic pain, over time, the brain becomes hypersensitive to pain signals, which increases pain. Pain is a danger signal. When something happens, such as touching a hot surface or twisting your ankle, nerve endings in the body send a signal to your brain, and the brain interprets this signal as pain. In this way, all pain is regulated by the brain.

As a scientist and clinician, I've long been struck by how trauma, chronic pain, and addiction often travel together. For many patients, these conditions form a tangled knot that is difficult to unravel with traditional therapies. Most psychotherapeutic approaches treat trauma, pain, and addiction in isolation, yet what patients truly need is an integrated approach that addresses them simultaneously. Post- traumatic stress disorder ( PTSD) is highly prevalent among people with chronic pain.

My wife suffers from health issues that make sex painful. I never pressure her, and her wellbeing is always my top priority, so for years I've "taken care of myself." However, she also isn't a "touchy-feely person," while I love cuddles, holding hands, and kissing. As the years have gone by, I've grown resentful. I feel undesired and unloved. I no longer initiate any sexual moves.

The term gamification, which means applying game design principles in other contexts, became a buzzword about 15 years ago, mainly driven by companies offering to gamify business processes. The approach aims to leverage game mechanics to increase engagement and motivation ("Get on the leader board!" "Gain power-ups!" "Level up your character!"), so it naturally became popular in education. Multiple studies show that incorporating game elements into learning tasks can boost results.

If you live with chronic pain, you already know how exhausting it can be. Not just the physical sensations but the constant trying-trying to push through, trying to find answers, trying to explain something that feels invisible to others. The search for relief can become its own full-time job, and it's easy to feel discouraged or alone. Over the years of running this site, I've heard from many people who've felt trapped in their bodies, like life was happening around them, not with them.

Researchers have launched a search engine that can quickly sift through the staggering volumes of biological data housed in public repositories. The team integrated data from seven publicly funded data archives, creating 18.8million unique DNA and RNA sequence sets and 210billion amino-acid sequence sets that users can search through using text prompts. The search engine, called MetaGraph, can also uncover genetic patterns hidden deep within expansive sequencing data sets without needing those patterns to be explicitly annotated in advance.

Across the United States, more than 18 million military veterans live with the lasting effects of service. For many, combat did not end when they returned home. The scars of war-whether in the form of physical injuries, chronic pain, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), or invisible mental health struggles-are daily realities. Yet despite decades of evidence supporting cannabis as a therapeutic tool, America's veterans still face barriers to safe and consistent access.

Her own, yes, but also the thousands of people she has met online who are, like her, recovering from spine surgery and often, like her, not their first. In the "Life After Back Surgery Support Group" on Facebook, they post questions, weary updates, and long, detailed accounts of their surgeries, sometimes good, sometimes very bad. Those with long-term pain reach for the language to describe it - "radiating," "unbearable," "like I've been kicked all night long,"

The evidence from this study can help clinical practices justify and move forward with offering remote pain coping skills training that is based on recommended cognitive behavioral therapy interventions. We hope to see that more people with chronic pain will have access to pain coping skills training in the future, and perhaps a choice of whether they would like to complete it on their own, at home, or by phone or video conference with a health coach,

As of August 2025, New York is home to approximately 563,400 veterans. This represents around 3.6% of the state's adult population, placing New York 51st among U.S. states and territories for veterans per capita. While the percentage may appear modest, the impact of this community is anything but small. Veterans have long played a vital role in the fabric of New York life, and their presence is felt across cities, towns, and neighborhoods-including Long Island.

Recent research into chronic pain, which afflicts millions of Americans, has led to a surprising source: the brain.

This is the point where temporary soreness turns into chronic pain, where that dull, nagging ache becomes the new normal. It affects more than just your muscles. Your sleep suffers. Your energy drops. Over time, your brain circuits that process pain grow more sensitive, creating a vicious cycle that's hard to break. What determines whether you bounce back or break down? That's the question researchers at the State University of Campinas in Brazil set out to answer.

The day I was originally supposed to write about the connection between chronic pain and antidepressants, my hands and wrists hurt so much, I couldn't type for longer than a few minutes at a time. Ah, the irony. Thankfully, the pain mostly retreated over the course of a weekend. In the past, I've had to take time off work for weeks as typing, or any activity that involved using my hands, became nigh impossible.

The Switch Stick Folding Seat is a part cane, part portable seat, essential for travel days, lightweight but sturdy, and convenient for resting in line or taking pressure off legs.

New research indicates that pain symptoms evolved to signal to others when help is needed, fostering a community of helpers around those in pain.

Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome is a connective tissue disorder that can cause chronic pain and fatigue among other symptoms.

Chiropractic adjustments support nervous system function, while therapy builds emotional resilience.

Epidermolysis bullosa (EB) affects the skin's ability to withstand friction and trauma, causing painful blisters and sores that can limit mobility and quality of life.

I had theories, of course. Looking back, these tended to change quite frequently, and yet the fear was always the same: in short, that I was dying, that I had some dreadful and no doubt painful disease.

As a former gymnast, my life has been greatly affected by injuries from childhood sports, leading to surgeries and teaching my kids to listen to their bodies.