Friday, September 1, 2023

Some forms of chronic pain are particularly mysterious | China banned seafood from Japan. Some tourists are eating it in Tokyo. | It’s been called ‘the greatest museum of prehistoric art’—but few tourists know it exists

View online | Unsubscribe (one-click).
For inquiries/unsubscribe issues, Contact Us




SMU - Sustainability Strategies Programme

Some forms of chronic pain are particularly mysterious - The Economist   

When she was only 14, Catherine Charlwood noticed a swelling in her right forearm. It was accompanied by a heavy muscular ache that made daily activities difficult. As a talented clarinettist at a British school where regular practice was on the timetable, the pain was deeply worrying. She was told it was repetitive strain injury, and would disappear within six weeks. When those weeks had gone and the pain remained, she was diagnosed with tendonitis. She did her best to make do, minimising her music practice and learning to write with her left hand. Eventually, when playing the clarinet was no longer feasible, she had to leave the school.

When the pain continued past the six months which is typical of tendonitis, doctors recommended surgery. “Each time they opened me up, what they were looking for wasn’t there,” she says. The second of those procedures, intended to relieve pressure on her radial nerve, actively made things worse. Since then, she occasionally experiences what feels like electricity crackling down the scar left by the procedure. “The volume can turn up, and it can turn up a lot, but it doesn’t turn down,” she says. Further diagnoses have come and gone, but the true origins of her pain remain mysterious.

Chronic pain, however it is experienced by people, is an enormous problem (see chart). As opposed to acute pain, which is a short-lived response to a dangerous or noxious event, chronic pain is widely defined as lasting for three months or longer. It has no discernible evolutionary purpose and often no identifiable trigger. It is best thought of as a disease, one that affects around 30% of the world’s population and carries with it a significant economic cost, in medical treatment, lost labour productivity and caregiving. Around one in ten of those affected are estimated to have disabling pain, making it the leading cause of disability worldwide.

Continued here


SMU - Sustainability Strategies Programme




SMU - Sustainability Strategies Programme


NUS - Chief Strategy Officer Programme


You are receiving this mailer as a TradeBriefs subscriber.
We fight fake/biased news through human curation & independent editorials.
Your support of ads like these makes it possible. Alternatively, get TradeBriefs Premium (ad-free) for only $2/month
If you still wish to unsubscribe, you can unsubscribe from all our emails here
Our address is 309 Town Center 1, Andheri Kurla Road, Andheri East, Mumbai 400059 - 433006120

No comments:

Post a Comment