Chronic pain is pain that has lasted for a long time. In medicine, the distinction between acute and chronic pain has traditionally been determined by an arbitrary interval of time since onset; the two most commonly used markers being 3 months and 6 months since onset, though some theorists and researchers have placed the transition from acute to chronic pain at 12 months. Others apply acute to pain that lasts less than 30 days, chronic to pain of more than six months duration, and subacute to pain that lasts from one to six months. A popular alternative definition of chronic pain, involving no arbitrarily fixed durations is "pain that extends beyond the expected period of healing."
Read more about Chronic Pain: Classification, Pathophysiology, Management, Epidemiology, Comorbidities and Sequelae
Famous quotes containing the words chronic and/or pain:
“Only then can the chronic inattention
Of our lives drape itself around us, conciliatory....”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“When pain of the world surrounds us with darkness and despair,
When searching just confounds us with false hopes ev’rywhere,
When lives are starved for meaning and destiny is bare,
We are called to follow Jesus and let God’s healing flow through us.”
—Jim Strathdee (20th century)