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Mind-body therapies alleviate pain in people prescribed opioids
A new study published Nov. 4, 2019, in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine details the first comprehensive look across the scientific literature at the role of mind-body therapies in addressing opioid-treated pain. The researchers found that certain mind-body therapies can reduce pain, as well as reduce opioid use, among patients treated with prescription opioids.
"These findings are critical for medical and behavioral health professionals as they work with patients to determine the best and most effective treatments for pain," said Eric Garland, lead author on the study, associate dean for research at the University of Utah College of Social Work and the director of the University of Utah's Center on Mindfulness and Integrative Health Intervention Development.
Garland explained that mind-body therapies focus on changing behavior and the function of the brain with the goal of improving quality of life and health. Mind-body therapies include clinical use of meditation/mindfulness, hypnosis, relaxation, guided imagery, therapeutic suggestion and cognitive-behavioral therapy.
[...] They found that meditation/mindfulness, hypnosis, therapeutic suggestion and cognitive-behavioral therapy all demonstrated significant improvements in pain severity. They also found that the majority of the meditation/mindfulness, therapeutic suggestion and cognitive-behavioral therapy studies showed improvements in opioid use or misuse. In contrast, two studies utilizing relaxation found significantly worsened results in opioid dosing.
[...] "A study published earlier this year projected that by 2025, some 82,000 Americans will die each year from opioid overdose," said Garland. "Our research suggests that mind-body therapies might help alleviate this crisis by reducing the amount of opioids patients need to take to cope with pain. If all of us -- doctors, nurses, social workers, policymakers, insurance companies and patients -- use this evidence as we make decisions, we can help stem the tide of the opioid epidemic."
Eric L. Garland, Carrie E. Brintz, Adam W. Hanley, Eric J. Roseen, Rachel M. Atchley, Susan A. Gaylord, Keturah R. Faurot, Joanne Yaffe, Michelle Fiander, Francis J. Keefe. Mind-Body Therapies for Opioid-Treated Pain[$]. JAMA Internal Medicine, 2019; DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2019.4917
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday November 08 2019, @07:01PM (2 children)
Not being ironic or sarcastic about that part. I actually do read and pray. I think I have encyclopedic knowledge of the Revelation -- but haven't put it to the test in closed book format. I think it amusing if people compare that negatively to new age hocus pocus.
And I've made myself the butt of a joke here sometimes. Recent example was on the topic of a treatment for people in vegetative state or unconscious. I joked that my fellow java programmers and I might be interested in this. Or "in my experience with tin foil hats . . .". And a few others. This all started on Usenet's moderated rec.humor.funny with the original moderator. I found it hilarious. I was much younger. I wanted to understand what made those jokes so funny. After almost three decades, I think there are several common patterns for humor. I try to look for things that fit one of the patterns.
Yes. I would say that is true. But naturally my alternative method is obviously objectively better than the new age hocus pocus. /s And still there are days where I'll reach for the narcotic pain killers.
Another thing is to learn to breathe slowly. Calm down. Relax. I've figured that out without looking at any type of learning or studying. Just figured it out through practice. I've observed how women in labor breathe a certain way, and mimic that sometimes.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday November 08 2019, @10:54PM (1 child)
Sorry it was hard for me to distinguish. I read more than one place that Groucho Marx would sometimes get upset because if he got genuinely mad and insulting at someone the other person would laugh it off as a funny "joke" from Groucho. Your posts are often entertaining as well as making one think.
Anyway.... The good part is that what works for you is what works. New age stuff might work better for someone else. So long as it actually works, more power to them, and you. It's taken medicine a long while to recognize that there are things which complement existing medical therapies, and that people will indeed use other therapies as alternatives to medicine. And there are plenty of clinical people who don't believe in CAM, either, or try to minimize it. We still don't have good methods to objectify pain (not ones that keep someone conscious, anyway), so we still rely on subjective reporting more than anything else to judge efficacy. But if it's working for you, awesome!
Focused breathing techniques are great methods. There are forms of meditation, by the way, which outright claim for themselves that all they are teaching is focused breathing - no additional new-age belief required. (The same is true for many "mindfulness" techniques - try to control your focus and your experience changes whether one is concentrating on "the living force" or just trying to get how a joint feels into context with your whole body which may be feeling OK). But your carbon dioxide level (and bicarbonate, but CO2 is regulated by breathing), have a lot to do with how your blood regulates it's pH level which must always be not too acidic or alkalinic (7.35 to 7.45 pH is normal for your blood). A lot of your nervous system's control and the hormones which regulate exocrine systems take big cues from your blood pH, and vice-versa. Breathing well and using your breathing to stay in control has a lot to do with your pain perception. Not everything, as you point out. But a lot.
And then... you've got the pharmacology to help out as well, too. If pharmacology wasn't beneficial sometimes nobody would use it, either....
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday November 11 2019, @03:33PM
There seems to be a growing view that opioids are never good and nobody should take them. I think that used judiciously, one can use them for a long time (as I have, almost 11 years), and with careful use they most certainly do improve one's quality of life. Other ways of dealing with pain are good and hopefully help to avoid or reduce taking narcotic pain killers. I get triggered at the idea that nobody should take them for long term use. I am still on the weak dose. And I hope I never start looking to get tablets with a higher dosage.
As for my beliefs, reading the bible and praying, I don't think that changes my circumstances so much as that it changes me.
People in my life over the last decade or more have remarked about the change. I think when you're in pain a lot, it can get easier to want to help other people, be less selfish, not be so picky about lots of small things. The more I let go of the things of this world, the easier it is to help others, let others have their way, etc. I (and my spouse also) find that we're at a point where it is far more enjoyable to give gifts than to get them. At Christmas for example. What could anyone possibly get me that would make my life much better? After a lifetime to get things I wanted, the only things that I might possibly want but don't have are probably too expensive. But there is a joy in getting things for other people, for example.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.