Sufferers and researchers attest that nociplastic pain including chronic musculoskeletal pain, fibromyalgia, chronic low back pain, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic bladder and pelvic pain drastically affect quality of life, severely impacting social relations and the ability to work (Fitzcharles et al., 2021; Moseley, 2010).
Surgical and pharmaceutical interventions have low‐quality evidence for treatment, whereas psychosocial factors are frequently attributed (Fitzcharles et al., 2021; Moseley & Butler, 2017).
Nociplastic is a term that has entered the medical discourse in the last two years to describe conditions that are neither neuropathic nor nociceptive (Fitzcharles et al., 2021, p. 2107). Neuropathic involves pain that is related to disease or damage to nerves and nociceptive concerns disease or damage to tissues of the body (Cohen et al., 2021, p. 2082). Nociplastic pain is a condition often diagnosed by the elimination of other mechanisms (Fitzcharles et al., 2021).
Nociplastic pain is real however and has neurobiological markers in the central nervous system when advanced imaging is performed (Cohen et al., 2021). Nociplastic pain is emerging as a significant category affecting between five and fifteen percent of the general population (Fitzcharles et al., 2021, p. 2100). Due to the difficulty of diagnosis and incapacity of clinical staff to treat the condition,
nociplastic pain sufferers often feel distrust toward the health system, spending years seeking a diagnosis in the hopes of recognition and public support (Fitzcharles et al., 2021, p. 2102). When they do get a diagnosis they often wait between one and five years to attend a public pain clinic (Carr et al., 2017; Chen, David & Robinson, Lucy, 2020).
Often our ‘pain profile’ is often a mixture of the three types. Each component requires different approaches. It’s important to take charge of your pain profile and get the right support. With all the new knowledge we do not need to be at the mercy of long waitlists for specialists and pain clinics or therapists who will ‘fix’ all your pain with one modality.
People sometimes get annoyed when they hear they have persistent or nociplastic pain. They think it’s ‘all in the mind’. It’s not in your everyday conscious mind, it’s in your deeper neurobiological consciousness and it takes work to send it the right messages. The good news is that nociplastic pain can be reversed. As those in the business say, ‘neuroplasticity gets you into a situation, and neuroplasticity can get you out’. .