How can you delete/switch off pain?
So far, no possibilities have been discovered how to erase the pain memory with the help of medication. On the other hand, methods such as transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation, in which sensitive nerve fibers are controlled, acupuncture treatment, heat or cold therapy often provide relief. These methods belong to the so-called counter-irritation methods.
They are often able to inhibit the pain beyond the application for hours or even days. Typically, however, they can only achieve freedom from pain or improvement of the pain for a limited period of time. Of course, research is trying to get the problem of pain memory under control on a larger scale and is currently pursuing promising approaches.
Also a hypnosis therapy is sometimes used for chronic pain patients. It is called hypnotherapy. Through hypnosis the pain processing often changes noticeably.
Mostly patients resort to hypnosis therapy where all other methods have failed. The patient is put into a hypnotic state by the treating therapist. A state, in which all disturbing factors are faded out from the outside.
During this phase, the therapist gives the patient images to distract from the pain and to create an inner calm. In this way, the pain can be perceived differently. However, one should not enter the therapy with too high expectations.
Although hypnosis works well with many patients, a complete freedom from pain cannot be achieved with hypnosis.The pain is often relieved or eliminated over a limited period of time. Of course you should also be aware that hypnosis therapy does not work for all patients. Another method that comes close to hypnotherapy in principle by also changing the perception of pain is the relatively new method of “Relearning”.
The patient should take a pain medication for this and consciously expose himself to the movements/actions that normally cause a strong pain. The expected pain does not occur in this situation. With this method, an attempt is made to overwrite the pain memory with positive experiences. If this is repeated frequently, it may be possible to counteract the pain memory.
