The Chronic Pain Solution: Your Personal Path to Pain Relief [Paperback]

James N. Dillard (Author), Leigh Ann Hirschman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 30, 2003

Every morning, more than 50 million Americans wake up to another day in pain. If you are one of them, you know the way chronic pain can take over your life: the lost work and missed pleasures, the harsh drugs or surgeries, the feelings of anger and frustration, the endless search from doctor to doctor. It doesn’t have to be that way.

This remarkable book, by one of the leading pain specialists in America, puts in your hands the resources usually available only at the most sophisticated pain clinics. Recent research has shown that the solution to the puzzle of pain is almost never one “magic bullet” treatment. What works is a combination of therapies--often three or more--customized to your individual needs. Some drugs or surgeries can actually make your condition worse, while surprisingly gentle alternative therapies can provide measurable, lasting relief. The key is knowing how to combine the best of both conventional and alternative medicine.

Dr. James Dillard offers you what few physicians today are trained to provide:

• fascinating new information on how pain affects your body and mind--including six myths that can keep you from healing
• a detailed guide to more than 40 treatment methods, from state-of-the-art microsurgery and pharmaceuticals to acupuncture,
yoga, and biofeedback
• individual chapters on the 12 most common types of pain, from arthritis and back pain to fibromyalgia and migraines--clearly indicating what works and what to avoid
• The Pain-Control Diet--and 20 top supplements for pain relief
• how to build your pain-management team and get what you need from your insurance company
• checklists, self-evaluations, and guides for tracking treatment
• special chapters on children, seniors, pregnant women, terminal pain--plus how you can help a loved one in pain

You can take back your life from pain. The Chronic Pain Solution will guide you every step of the way.


From the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

You might recognize Dillard: director of complementary medical services at the University Pain Center, he has served time on Oprah and the CBS Evening News. Here he outlines 12 major types of pain and over 40 methods of treatment.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“A superb book! At once medically precise and warmly accessible, The Chronic Pain Solution wages a successful frontal assault on pain, perhaps the greatest obstacle to wellness in our society. A must read for patients--and their doctors.”
--Mehmet Oz, M.D., Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, author of Healing from the Heart


“A fine, useful, and highly readable guide to the important field of integrative pain treatment.”
--James S. Gordon, M.D., Director, the Center for Mind-Body Medicine; author of Manifesto for a New Medicine

“The best book I’ve ever read on how to approach and relieve chronic pain. I highly recommend this wise and practical book to the millions who live with pain.”
--Christiane Northrup, M.D.,author of Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom and The Wisdom of Menopause



From the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (September 30, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553381113
• ISBN-13: 978-0553381115
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 1 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #858,899 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Holistic approach firmly grounded in modern medicine, July 17, 2003

By 

Dennis Littrell (SoCal) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Chronic Pain Solution: The Comprehensive, Step-by-Step Guide to Choosing the Best of Alternative and Conventional Medicine (Hardcover)

Chronic pain has become perhaps the most trying and least understood health problem in this country. Millions of people suffer from chronic pain, and most of them have little hope that their pain will end. Many doctors are ignorant about the pain experience of their patients, and some are even dubious that the pain exists!

Part of the problem is that pain is an entirely subjective experience. It has no existence in the world outside of the pain sufferer (and the observable consequences of that pain). There are no instruments that can objectively measure pain. The plain fact, known only too well to chronic pain sufferers, is that nobody feels your pain but you, period. Dr. Dillard, however, among a growing number of progressive and caring physicians, realizes that the pain is real and has trained himself to appreciate and understand pain. On page 59 he even has a list of 68 adjectives for describing pain ranging from "aching" to "gnawing" to "wrenching."

Another part of the problem, as Dr. Dillard points out, is that many physicians have not had adequate training in pain management and tend to respond to their patients' needs from a narrow and relative uninformed perspective. A third part of the problem is that pain management is not a medical specialty. Most physicians simply are not experts in treating chronic pain.

I am not a chronic pain sufferer, but I know about this tragedy because someone I love has suffered for several years from near-constant pain of unclear origin. She has seen a number of doctors but has found little relief. To some extent she has become discouraged and cynical about ever finding help. I hope she will read this book and be inspired to renew her efforts to manage and reduce her pain.

Clearly this book does not offer a magic pill or any sort of miraculous solution. What it offers is an up-to-date and relatively thorough examination of ways to reduce and cope with chronic pain using methods combining alternative and conventional medicine.

Dr. Dillard's training and experience as both a chiropractor and a medical physician, and his open-minded and far ranging approach to the healing arts make this well-organized, well presented and eminently readable book the best I have read on the subject. Dillard begins with an attempt to understand pain using a whole body/whole mind approach. He encourages pain suffers to become part of a "pain management team" that includes the patient along with doctors, physical therapists and other professionals. His is a pro-active agenda in which he advocates "Taking Control of Your Treatment" (title of Part II).

Part III presents an evaluation of therapies from exercise, yoga, and meditation to acupuncture, pharmaceuticals, implants, and surgery. Part IV outlines the various complaints from headache through back pain and fibromyalgia to myofascial and complex regional pain syndrome. Part V focuses on "Special Considerations," pain management for children, pregnant women, the elderly and terminally ill. Dillard apparently has no prejudices against any given form of treatment, evaluating each according to its merits and appropriateness. He sees a place for methadone as well as meditation. Indeed, he usually recommends a combination of approaches.

Even though there is no magic bullet yet, and even though such a miracle may be many years in the future, Dr. Dillard's book offers hope that chronic pain can be reduced and managed (and in some cases eliminated entirely). People who are completely disabled by their pain can gain enough control to return to a more active lifestyle. Others who live only a reduced existence because of their pain may again find the joy in living. What Dr. Dillard's experience shows is that those who take an active part in managing their pain receive a synergistic effect by their active involvement. He emphasizes that immobility and lack of exercise (caused by the pain) tend to increase the pain experience, while exercise and an active engagement with life tend to reduce it. Consequently his approach for those whose pain is so bad they cannot exercise at all is to recommend even very strong pain medications so that exercise is possible, and then as activity increases to gradually lower the dosage.

This is an excellent first course in understanding and managing chronic pain and the sort of book that pain sufferers will want to read.

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Life-Saver, February 23, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Chronic Pain Solution: The Comprehensive, Step-by-Step Guide to Choosing the Best of Alternative and Conventional Medicine (Hardcover)

This is the best book I have ever seen on the subject, and in 10 years of back problems I've seen a lot. If I had the money I would buy 100 copies and pass them out to doctors and physical therapists (and also to my family so they could stop asking "if you've already had back surgery how come you're still hurting?"). Not only is it full of useful practical information, it breathes an optimistic, take charge, never-say-die attitude which is just what the doctor ordered. (I cannot imagine why one reviewer said it was depressing. I think it seriously likely that he/she read a different book). Highest possible recommendation!

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dr. Michael L. Johnson, February 28, 2004

By 

Michael L. Johnson (Sherwood, WI United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Chronic Pain Solution: Your Personal Path to Pain Relief (Paperback)

An excellent book!!! Dr. Dillard does a great job with his in-depth explanations of chronic pain and its various treatment protocols. In my 21 years of private practice have treated many cases in which patients who suffered from chronic pain were accused of "faking it" by their doctors. Chronic pain is REAL!! In my humble opinion, medicine does a great job in the treatment of acute care ( broken bones, heart attacks, strokes, etc.) but drops the ball when it comes to the chronic pain patient. Dr. Dillard shows you how to get back in the game!

Dr. Michael L. Johnson, author of "What Do You Do When the Medications Don't Work--A Non-Drug Treatment of Dizziness, Migriane Headaches, Fibromyalgia, and Other Chronic Conditions".