Pain is an experience unique to you in both mind and body. An understanding of pain science is fundamental to resolving pain.

Pain is the protector, alerting the brain to a threat. Think about that time you touched something hot, it hurts and before you have even time to think about it being painful your hand has instantly moved away from the hot object protecting you from further damage. It’s often the case that you don’t feel pain instantly, the pain is far worse after the event.

Does pain always mean tissue damage, or can you have one without the other?

We refer to the body as ‘tissue’ lots of different types of cells all working together. Nerves are the electric signals which can be influenced by cells surrounding them. The short answer is that you can have tissue damage without pain, ever noticed a bruise and have no idea where its come from? And you can have pain without tissue damage. The longer pain is experienced the more probable there is no tissue damage.

One of the most dramatic examples of how pain does not always mean harm is Phantom limb pain, this is when a limb is amputated, the person can still feel pain in a foot that isn’t even there after it was removed and its all healed. It can last years despite the person knowing that it is not there. This is where the brain can influence what we feel, how we interpret the information and keep us in a state of being highly sensitized to a threat. Even when there is no threat of tissue damage.

You may have been told that there is ‘normal’ degeneration from a scan or that there is little to be seen on a scan. Scans do not always give us the answer to the problem. This can be really frustrating as we just want to know what it is so we can fix it. We can however reduce pain without fully knowing the cause of it.