Is There a Role for Laboratory Testing in Pain Medicine? or How to Objectify the Subjective?

Pain patients can be difficult. They have a tendency to be angry, mistrustful, anxious and depressed. In return this provokes among clinicians negative feelings of frustration, resentment and dislike, challenging the therapeutic dialogue. It seems that more-or-less similar patients, with more-or-less similar symptoms and diagnosis, with more-or-less similar treatments, manifest radically different outcomes. Why is this? Is there a way to explore the Subjectivity of Pain? Is there a way to Objectify the Subjective? Dr. Alex Cahana, Chief, Division of Pain Medicine, Anesthesiology, at the University of Washington begins to grapple with these troubling questions in this presentation.

To see more videos from the University of Washington visit uwtv.org.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• health
• medicine
• education