A recent study of 125 patients seeking treatment for chronic pain analyzed the role of anxiety on everyday functioning and found:...individuals with high levels of anxiety due to chronic pain exhibit more emotional distress and disability.Do we really need a study to tell us this?!?!
To read about this study click HERE.
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Anxiety disorders are a unique group of illnesses that fill people’s lives with persistent, excessive, and unreasonable anxiety, worry, and fear. They include generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), panic disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), social anxiety disorder (SAD), and specific phobias. Although anxiety disorders are serious medical conditions, they are treatable.
An anxiety disorder and a co-occurring chronic pain disease can make a person’s health more difficult to treat. But a variety of treatments and lifestyle changes can offer relief. Possible health complications are noted below:
• Increased disability or reduced functioning
• Poorer quality of life
• Poorer response to treatment
• Poorer treatment adherence
• Increased perception of disease severity
Chronic pain sufferers who also have an anxiety disorder may have lower pain tolerance or a lower pain threshold. People with an anxiety disorder may be more sensitive to medication side effects or more fearful of harmful side effects of medication than chronic pain suffers who aren’t anxious, and they may also be more fearful of pain than someone who experiences pain without anxiety.
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