{"id":6171,"date":"2014-08-25T06:33:04","date_gmt":"2014-08-25T10:33:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/?p=6171"},"modified":"2016-11-17T19:11:07","modified_gmt":"2016-11-17T23:11:07","slug":"treatment-of-psychiatric-symptoms-when-you-have-pain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/6171\/treatment-of-psychiatric-symptoms-when-you-have-pain\/","title":{"rendered":"Treatment of Psychiatric Symptoms When You Have Pain"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to the\u00a0series<\/em> Why You Should\u00a0See a Pain Management Psychiatrist<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/strong><\/p>\n

People with pain also develop psychiatric disorders.\u00a0For example, depression (8-50% of patients with pain), anxiety (19-50%), PTSD (10%), sleep disturbance (50% or more), and drug and alcohol problems (3-19%) are common in patients with pain. Let’s look at some important issues related to treating <\/em>these problems.<\/p>\n

1. Identifying\u00a0symptoms<\/strong><\/p>\n

To be able to treat<\/em> psychiatric symptoms, they first have to be identified<\/em>. Your medical doctor should be asking about these common symptoms and referring you for treatment if appropriate. You should also report if you’re having such symptoms. Don’t be embarrassed or feel like you’re complaining. Getting help is important!<\/p>\n

2. Taking symptoms seriously<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you’re having significant depression, anxiety or other symptoms, it’s important to report these to start to get treatment for them. These symptoms should not<\/em> be dismissed as, Of course you have depression,\u00a0it’s\u00a0because of your pain.\u00a0Chronic pain does not<\/em> automatically\u00a0 mean depression, anxiety and disturbed sleep. There’s treatment for these symptoms! And they should be treated!<\/p>\n

3. Treat all the disorders that are present<\/strong><\/p>\n

We know that if a psychiatric problem is present along with pain, it’s crucial to treat both. Treating just 1 doesn’t make the other go away. For example, if someone has depression and pain, treating just pain doesn’t necessarily mean the depression will go away. And sometimes neither<\/em> gets better unless you treat both.<\/p>\n

4. Treatment<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are both therapies and medications to treat nearly all psychiatric diseases. Medication should be used only along with <\/em>therapy. Unless symptoms are severe, I strongly recommend trying therapy first, before medication, to see if just therapy alone can work. There are times, when psychiatric symptoms are severe, that both will be started together, but that’s less common. Most people with pain disorders are already on several medications and\u00a0have\u00a0side effects, so trying non-medication treatment first makes sense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to the\u00a0series Why You Should\u00a0See a Pain Management Psychiatrist. People with pain also develop psychiatric disorders.\u00a0For example, depression (8-50% of patients with pain), anxiety (19-50%), PTSD (10%), sleep disturbance (50% or more), and drug and alcohol problems (3-19%) are common in patients with pain. Let’s look at some important issues related to treating these […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6171"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6171\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7787,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6171\/revisions\/7787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}