Pain medicine: general view to the problem

Abstract

The explosive growth of our knowledge of every aspect of pain in recent years has produced major advances in the classification and management of the varieties of pain. However, despite of advancing knowledge in the field of pain medicine for last decades, the burden of pain remains unacceptably high. Epidemiological studies point to the high prevalence of chronic pain across the world associated with staggering socioeconomic costs. Unfortunately, existing therapies fail to offer good pain relief to the majority of these patients. There have been some modest advances with the approval of some new therapies, but nevertheless pain medicine is still waiting to find out new initiatives and approaches that serve to a better understanding of pain mechanisms leading to effective therapies.

Keywords

• pain concept
• acute and chronic pain
• pain management