Diet
It is all too easy for a pain sufferer to gain weight from reduced activity and comfort eating. Reduced energy levels and depression can also result in less care being taken about obtaining a balanced diet with a greater emphasis on convenience foods, takeaways or fried foods.
Diet is an area in which the patient can exercise a greater degree of control over their sense of well being. Key issues to keep in mind for the professional not trained in nutrition include checking on fluid intake. Insufficient fluid, high consumption of sugary drinks, caffeine containing drinks such as V, Lift-plus (and of course coffee) etc can be taken as a means of seeking to increase energy but caffeine as a central nervous system stimulant can also increase the experience of some neuropathic pain.
Similarly fad diets, too many carbohydrates (or too little) can also influence pain experience.
Exercise
Graded, appropriate and regular exercise is a vital part of any program designed to help chronic pain. The key issue is to avoid the “boom or bust” cycle in which the patient tries to do too much on their good days and so sets themselves up for a pain flare that then reduces activity substantially in succeeding days. A similar problem is when a patient develops movement fear because of experiencing pain associated with activity. This arises from a perfectly normal human desire to avoid pain but also can cause more problems than it solves. If the patient consistently avoids exercise as a means of reducing pain then they will decondition over time and their muscles will deteriorate both reducing further what they can do while also increasing the risk of further injury. Deconditioned muscles will also be more likely to experience neuropathic pain.
Client Groups
Our clinicians have experience in working with a range of different cultural and age groups.
While most of our patients tend to be adults we do have clinicians with a special interest in working with children, couples and families, adolescents, women’s issues, men and with groups.
Some of our clinicians are skilled in workshop and group facilitation and do regular corporate consulting with some local organisations.
We do see a wide range of clients on referral from local medical practices, local government agencies, the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and private insurance companies.