Chronic Pain
Acute pain is a vital, protective mechanism that permits us to live in an environment fraught with potential dangers. In contrast, chronic pain serves no such physiologic role and is itself not a symptom, but a disease state. It is usually defined as pain which lasts beyond the ordinary duration of time that an insult or injury to the body needs to heal. This is commonly thought of as four to six weeks, although others have chosen three months as the dividing line between acute and chronic pain. The difference is more than semantic; pain that outlasts this period may be a harbinger of a serious condition, in which treatment delay may lead to an irreversible and intractable condition.
