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Psychological Treatments

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Academic Pain Medicine

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Abstract

Pain is a multidimensional sensory-perceptual phenomenon. Psychological treatments address the cognitive, emotional, and social elements of the pain experience to mitigate suffering and improve functioning. The doctor-patient relationship establishes rapport and provides the setting for psychological therapy. Cognitive therapy enables patients to identify, challenge, and replace erroneous or unhelpful beliefs with more accurate and balanced beliefs. Behavioral therapy decreases pain behaviors, promotes wellness behaviors, and provides patients with useful coping strategies. A growing evidence base underscores the importance of psychosocial factors in determining outcomes of treatment and supports the use of cognitive-behavioral techniques to treat various pain conditions.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Frank H. Netter School of Medicine, Quinnipiac University, Hamden, CT, USA

    Isaac Cohen

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  1. Isaac Cohen
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Pain Medicine Fellowship, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Department of Neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA

    Yury Khelemsky

  2. Pain Medicine Fellowship, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA

    Anuj Malhotra

  3. Regional Anesthesia and Acute Pain Medicine Fellowship, Department of Anesthesiology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx, NY, USA

    Karina Gritsenko

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Cohen, I. (2019). Psychological Treatments. In: Khelemsky, Y., Malhotra, A., Gritsenko, K. (eds) Academic Pain Medicine. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18005-8_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18005-8_16

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