Hypnotherapy For Arthritis Pain – What Are Remedies For Arthritis Pain?

Arthritis pain may come about from many different areas and affect people differently. One person may feel as if their joints are on fire or inflamed while others may experience fatigue in their muscles. While everyone has different tolerance levels with regards to pain, the severity of the pain is associated with damage to a person’s joints. While there are many solutions that exist out there, some have nagging side effects while natural solutions may be the premier option for managing pain.

What are some of the symptoms that a person should be aware of that could be strong indicators of arthritis? If a person is feeling stiffness in their arms or legs consistently over time, it may be time for a doctor’s visit. If it is also getting harder and harder to get out of bed because of swelling; this is another area that would need further examination. If left untreated, emotional attributes like anxiety or getting the blues can also have a negative effect on the person dealing with excessive joint pain. In severe cases, options like climbing the stairs in the house can seem impossible.

Is arthritis pain something that we all have to deal with as we get older? While a person’s joints may deteriorate over time, being in a severe car accident or experiencing sports injuries over time may also contribute to arthritis pain. A reason why severe pain in one person may appear mild in another is because of a person’s sensitivity to their nervous system. The nervous system determines the pain threshold that a person may feel.

Finding out ways to manage pain is the first step in dealing with problems with joint pain. The bones that are a part of the skeletal system in the body are held together by the joints and cartilage. Movements must be fluid to maintain a healthy body. Ways that a person can manage joint pain are by incorporating stretching exercises like yoga or finding other ways to increase physical energy. Living a sedentary lifestyle will most definitely dampen a person’s mood and excise is another way to bring about emotional well-being.

Inflammation happens as the body attempts to heal itself from harm. Cartilage exists to safeguard bones from pressing against each other because this is how a body experiences wear and tear. As a result, a person experiences extreme pain in addition to feeling stiff with a limited range of motion.

Unfortunately, many people seek immediate relief by using medication that may or may not be necessary. Getting cortisol shots are also seen as a viable solution although it is very short-term. The short-term relief that is felt may ultimately lead to side effects like excessive bleeding, impairment of ligaments or exposure to an infection.

Clinical hypnotherapist Tom Mueller explains the benefits of hypnotherapy for pain management in this way, “Unlike medications, hypnosis does not become less effective with the use and does not require stronger and stronger doses to cope with pain. While patients may have to ingest costly medications several times a day for years, they have the potential for reducing or eliminating their pain in just a few hypnotic sessions for significantly less cost.”

Does hypnosis always work?

In the area of pain control, everyone can be helped to SOME degree. There are essentially five categories into which subjects fall:
 

1. Those who find permanent and total relief.
 
2. Those that have a decrease in the severity of pain.
 
3. Those who experience pain relief initially, but who need occasional reinforcement.
 
4. Those that experience intermittent relief.
 
5. Those that still have pain but feel 10-30 % less pain than before.
 

What accounts for these differences in relief? The answer appears to be the patient’s susceptibility to hypnosis – the level of relaxation reached during the hypnotic sessions. The deeper the relaxation, the more effective the pain reduction.

Certainly, no treatment for pain – whether chemical, physical or psychological – is effective all the time. Hypnosis has shown over and over again that it can help people reduce or eliminate both chronic and acute pain. Best of all, it works without any side effects.
 

Since arthritis pain is a growing phenomenon as the population gets older, the scientific community has also begun to pursue the idea of the correlation between joint pain and the psychological effects of dealing with this discomfort in the body. In 2002, the European Federation of Chapters of the Association for the Study of Pain conducted a study to verify whether or not hypnosis and related techniques related to relaxation could assist in relieving a person from pain in the joints. A group of patients dealing with varying degrees of pain associated with their hips or knees were given hypnotherapy sessions. They were also split into two groups where the other group did not have exposure to the hypnosis treatment. The findings were that the group that had hypnotherapy had reported that pain was lowered after the session at a greater rate than the group that had no exposure at all. Also, there were follow-up sessions to monitor whether or not these hypnotherapy sessions were long-lasting. For those that kept up with relaxation techniques, the pain levels stayed minimal while pain increased for those that did not keep up with any level of treatments.

In another study conducted at the University Of Washington School Of Medicine, a 73-year-old patient was unable to exercise and had negative reactions to anti-inflammatory drugs. After only three sessions of treatments using hypnosis, the patient was able to go back to living day-to-day without experiencing pain. After this initial test, scientists worked with over 900 additional candidates involving 18 variations of hypnosis with pain management where 75% of the patients expressed relief after their hypnotherapy sessions.

No one wants to go through life experiencing various levels of pain; arthritis continues to plague our aging population at a staggering rate. While many may try various medications, people are embracing more natural means of relieving pain that is not associated with any side effects. Hypnotherapy for arthritis pain has proven to be an excellent solution that can help anyone dealing with day to day discomfort. It is important to speak with a medical practitioner to design a tailored plan to improve pain levels that also achieve the desired results.