Managing Chronic Back Pain

[Kristina Kelleher]

Hello I am trying to find ways of managing chronic back pain .

I have just completed a pain management program and I would like to know of any exercises and hydrotherapy exercises or programs around

I live in Melbourne Victoria

If anyone has any suggestions or have been or are in a similar situation I would love to here from you.

 

[amethist]

Hi Kristina

We are a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder support site, has the problems with your back caused this, or should I say have you been diagnosed with PTSD, because of your back pain problems.

If you have just completed a pain management program, surely they gave you all this kind of information there. ??

Exercises for back pain and the best way to look after it from now on should have part and parcel of the your treatment, before the pain program..

Amethist

 

[Antiquity]

Hi Kristina

I might be able to gve you some insight on this, but at the outset, I am not familiar with the PMP's or hydro progs in Melbourne. I'am from another part of the globe, but I have done a PMP....and I guess they are more or less the same the world over...in what they aim to achieve through better self-management.

For us, the PMP was mandatory, and you had to complete the course before be considered for invasive treatments.

If you want to, I'd would really love to hear what PMP's are like over in Oz!

My PMP was a three week OPD programme, and it was headed by a consultant anaesthetist. Other members of the PMP team included a physio, psychologist and an occupational therapist. The programme was very basic. Physio done their physio assessment and then a programme of exercises was devised so that any exercises that we did do, would not cause us further harm and land us across the road in the Hosp. The purpose of Occupational Therapy was to give us something to focus on at given times, and OT gave us something where at the end of it there would be a benefit. For us, one major benefit was the support and assistance we got from each other as we all helped in making the small side chairs that we had no choice but to complete by the end of week 3. I found OT particularly boring!!!

We also had Group Therapy sessions with a psychologist. To be honest, I didnt really learn that much from these sessions. Having said that, we did learn that not only did CP affect us physically, psychologically, socially and vocationally, it also impacted on the functioning of the family unit and loved ones. For the first time, there was the strong realisation that you were not alone (or going nuts), and that our experiences and feelings were not isolated to ourselves or unique. There seemed to be common threads that emerged around certain issues.

On one of the sessions, we allowed our family members to get involved....it was like group Family Therapy So they also managed to get in on the sharing and learning that was going o.

The major flaw in the PMP was the total lack of emphasis on vocational rehab. I still think that this element should be incorporated into all PMP's and the early intervention is a must. Vocational advisors would be practitioners who should have indepth knowledge of Chronic Pain (and I'd even go as far to say that this same model should be applied to PTSD). The advisor could sit with the client and in a process of partnership one could examine your ambitions and goals, review your qualifications and work history, and set in motion a course of action that will either send you on a course of re-education or re-training. My hope would be an intervention programme that enables people to gain meaningful employment, with upward mobility, and that the job is not a dead end job but one that allows them to apply their personal and work-related skills to the fullest extent possible.

It's beyond my remit to give any med advice, but what I would say, is could you not get back in contact with the course coordinator or even the physio who would be able to guide you on what exercises/activities would be best, taking into account the nature of your injury.

When I left my PMP, I was advised to do back exercises, walking, cycling (in the home), and swimming (that's one thing I havent mastered yet).

Sorry for going on a bit....

 

[Ted Moen]

Hey Kristina, living with back pain is no fun. I began experiencing back pain shortly after returning from Vietnam. PTSD hadn't been invented yet, and we were just supposted to put stuff behind us and pick up civilian life wherever we left off. My first lower back spasms serious enough to land me in the hospital were in 1970, and would reoccur at that intensity about twice a year, with somewhat lesser pain inbetween. I learned to live with it (just like my other PTSD symptoms).

30 years later, while I was in therapy for my other PTSD symptoms, they started an experimental massage therapy program for people with PTSD at the VA I use (Detroit VAMC). My therapist recommended me to the program, but I refused because I could not imagine letting myself lay on a massage table so completely vulnerable. The next year when I was barely able to walk from the pain both she and my primary care person recommended me to the program. I agreed to give it a try.

It has been over 20 years since my last lower back spasm serious enough to put me down for a week. Most (over 90%) of the time I am back pain free. The only time I experience significant back pain these days is when I fall off my exercise and massage program.

What I have learned is my back pain is very much related to PTSD. The internal physical stress is every bit as intense as the emotional stress. Just as I have learned to manage my emotional symptoms, I have had to learn to manage the physical symptoms. I was in the VA's massage therapy program (once a week) for about 10 years. In addition to the massage, the therapists taught me the specific muscles that tended to give me problems and exercises and stretches I could incorporate into my exercise routine. After 10 years I decided I didn't have a physical problem any more and dropped the program (it's a significant drive for me to Detroit). I thought the exercises and stretches I had learned would be enough. A couple of years later the pain came back. Now I get a massage every 2-3 weeks and do my exercise routine and life is good again.

I could tell you specific exercises and stretches that work for me, but what I really recommend is massage therapy and learning from the therapists the specific muscles that are knotting up from the internal stress the the exercises and stretches for those specific muscles. We are all different in the specifics of how the internal stress impacts our well-being.

Ted