7 Alternatives to Medication for Pain Management

We understand that pain management is important when a person is hurting. However, pain relief is often a complex issue, especially when pain is chronic or happens often. Mistakes or misuses of pain medicine can cause serious health problems and even death. If you are looking for alternatives to medication for managing your pain, here are 7 suggested techniques.

Meditation and Reducing Stress Can Reduce Pain

• Learn deep breathing or meditation to help with chronic pain. Deep breathing and meditation are techniques that help your body relax, which helps ease pain.
• Reduce stress in your life. Stress intensifies chronic pain. Negative feelings like depression, anxiety, stress, and anger can increase the body’s sensitivity to pain.

Focus on a Healthy Lifestyle to Reduce Pain

• Boost chronic pain relief with the natural endorphins produced from exercise. Endorphins are brain chemicals that help improve your mood while also blocking pain signals.
• Eat a healthy diet. A well-balanced diet is important in many ways- aiding your digestive process, reducing heart disease risk, keeping weight under control, and improving blood sugar levels.
• Cut back on alcohol, which can worsen sleep problems. Pain makes sleep difficult, and alcohol can make sleep problems worse.

Be Aware of How Your Body Reacts to Pain

• Track your pain level and activities every day. To effectively treat your pain, your doctor needs to know how you’ve been feeling between visits. Keeping a log or journal of your daily “pain score” will help you track your pain. At the end of each day, note your pain level on the 1 to 10 pain scale.
• Get a massage. Massage can help reduce stress and relieve tension -- and is being used by people living with all sorts of chronic pain, including back and neck pain.

If you need help managing your chronic pain, CHI Health can help. Find a provider today.