Description
What’s a Pain Profile?
The Pain Profile is a tool to help you organize and record your personal pain biography. It allows you to collect your symptoms and their frequency as well as other issues, in one place as they arise. It outlines your specific situation: your diagnosis (injuries, conditions, or other chronic pain issues), current and past therapies, medications, supplements and practitioners, and any other important information about your pain (triggers, habits, etc).
Why?
The Pain Profile is a powerful tool that helps you connect the various facets of your pain management journey to discover patterns or gaps in your treatment and recovery. It makes you the manager of your pain journey – a key strategy in effective pain management.
Not only is the Pain Profile a personal tool, but it is a guide that doctors and other health professionals will use to support you. It is a direct and factual representation of your pain that allows practitioners to quickly and effectively assess your history so they can focus on helping you move forward.
How do I use it?
Use the Pain Profile to become the leader of your own pain management journey. Fill out the profile and review it before appointments with healthcare professionals. Bring your profile to your appointments and treatments so no detail in your journey is overlooked or forgotten. Take notes during appointments and ask for copies of reports and results to add to your pain profile.
Remember that you are in charge of your own body and you are the coordinator of your pain management team. Your practitioners do not necessarily communicate with each other – the pain profile keeps each practitioner informed so they can provide you with the best treatment and advice and move forward in helping you manage your pain successfully.