Revealing a revolutionary new way of understanding pain, this film explores treatment modalities that can help to resolve, manage and in some cases correct for chronic, everyday pain. Focusing on several different strategies that approach mind-body, body-mind, and physical interventions, it demonstrates how the pain-brain connection shapes our experience of pain and demonstrates that we can all use the power of our brain to help reshape our own pain journey.
Most people think of pain in terms of an injury or in inflammation. This type of pain serves a useful purpose, because when we are hurt, we protect ourselves to prevent further injury and allow healing. But neuropathic pain, which occurs because of an abnormal function of the nervous system, does not have the same benefit. This kind of pain includes a wide variety of disorders affecting any part of the nervous system. In some cases, the brain can receive a signal even if there is no painful stimulus. In other cases, sensory signals get crossed and are “misread” as pain.
Understanding the variety and complexity of our body’s expression of chronic pain leads toward a pathway for improved non- pharmaceutical and non-surgical treatment options.