Attitudes, beliefs, attributions and expectations may make pain appear worse as well as increasing the individual’s awareness of it. There may be excessive focus on body and pain processes. There may be great fears and worries related to the pain and the person may feel passive, helpless and hopeless.
As one patient remarked ‘ I’ve tried to become physically active in the past but I only felt more pain. It became easier to sit or lie down as it was the only way to avoid the pain.’ In measuring this type of pain, the use of personality assessment and anxiety profiles is of prime importance. Such questionnaires help the pain specialist by indicating whether a patient is depressed or anxious and to what extent. They help in evaluating the possibility of the effectiveness of specific treatments. Thus someone significantly depressed would not be given hypnosis until their depression is controlled.
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