Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

I’m spending a few days looking at practical ways for working with group CBT for chronic pain.  It’s the most researched form of CBT-based pain management, and offers some very helpful features for people with chronic pain.  I’ve looked at how groups can impart a sense of optimism and at how they help people with [...]

`Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

`Yesterday I started to look at why pain management using a CBT approach can work well in groups.  As I mentioned, it’s the most researched form of CBT-based pain management, and offers some very helpful features for people with chronic pain.  Yesterday I looked at how a group approach can offer participants a sense of [...]

Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

This week I’m looking a working effectively with groups for pain management using a CBT approach.  Someone said recently ‘why should six clinicians be tied up for three weeks with only six patients? there are other people who need pain management too’ – and over the past ten years I’ve seen numerous attempts to move [...]

A model of executive functioning and stress regulation

I’m a visual kind of girl, I need to see a diagram to help me conceptualise how the things I’ve been writing about recently all fit together. I’ve been looking at the various aspects of self regulation, emotions and executive functions and how this affects and is affected by stressors, of which chronic pain [...]

Going with the flow: emotion regulation and coping

I’m in two minds about attempting to regulate emotions. From ACT, and in particular, mindfulness, I’m learning that trying to control emotions and thoughts is darned near impossible – and unhelpful. From the research on the effect of pain on emotions and subsequently on self regulation, goals and coping, it seems that pain strongly [...]

Friday funnies!

It’s Canterbury Anniversary Day today, so the neighbourhood is all quiet, and it’s a beautiful day outside.  Forgive the dreadful funnies today – groan-inducing I know!

Emotions and self-regulation in chronic pain

I posted about the reciprocal effect of emotions on goal content and today I want to look a little further into this.
A profound statement in the paper by Hamilton, Karoly & Kitzman is this: ‘If emotional well-being influences the selection and the valuation of a particular goal, then it is likely that the relationship between [...]

Hypnosis: Response expectancies?

Let’s explore the proposed mechanisms in hypnosis as I wander through the subject this week.
According to some researchers, response expectancies, or ‘the expectation of one’s own non-volitional reactions to situational cues’ are thought to play a major part in both hypnosis and placebo responding. Let’s translate that: a person’s belief that they will respond to [...]

It was a piece of cake! Hypnosis for sleep and tummy pain

After briefly looking at hypnosis yesterday, I found this lovely case study written by Leora Kuttner of an 11 year old girl with problems going off to sleep, including tummy pain and anxiety.
The girl had been through CBT, and introduced to the idea that she had a ‘worry bug’, and that the way to rid [...]

Hypnosis for chronic pain management: How it works maybe?

There are plenty of people who look at me as if I’m stepping right into woowoo when I start to talk about hypnosis for managing chronic pain. I’m happy to say that science has provided some good evidence that not only does hypnosis have a neurophysiological basis, but it also has some good effect.
What [...]