Pain: Considering Complementary Approaches

Course overview

Course Description: This course is based upon material published by the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health and is available as an open-access article. This eBook is your guide to complementary health approaches for pain. It comes from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), which is part of the Federal Governments National Institutes of Health (NIH). Researchers are looking at the role of complementary health approaches in managing pain, and theyre learning new things all the time. Theyre finding out that some complementary approaches may be helpful, but others may not be. Theyre also learning whether these approaches are safe. This eBook covers the following topics: Chapter 1: About Pain and Complementary Health Approaches gives you some basic facts about pain and about complementary health approaches. Chapter 2: Safety of Complementary Health Approaches explains what you should consider to make sure that youre safe when you use complementary approaches. Chapters 3 through 11 discuss specific complementary approaches that people may use to help manage pain. Each chapter briefly explains the approach and summarizes the scientific information on whether its safe and helpful. Chapter 12: Other Complementary Health Approaches briefly discusses a few complementary approaches that havent been studied as extensively as the ones covered in earlier chapters. Chapters 13 and 14 discuss topics that you might want to think about if youre considering using a complementary health approach for pain. The eBook ends with Chapter 15: Frequently Asked Questions, which reviews the most important information from earlier chapters and gives you links to resources where you can find out more. This course on complementary health approaches to pain is designed for social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, nurses, and substance abuse counselors, who do clinical work. In addition, this course is appropriate for beginning, intermediate and advanced level practitioners who wish to develop their knowledge of complementary health approaches to pain. The course material includes a literature review of interventions and research. It may also be useful for licensed clinicians who require continuing clinical education courses for license renewal. The course is based on a journal article that includes research. It contains statistical analysis and data that some clinicians enjoy reading and others do not. A significant benefit of reading research-based articles for continuing education is they provide practitioners with the latest findings in their field. Authors: National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health Learning Objectives: This course will provide the practitioner with detailed information regarding complementary health approaches to pain. Specifically, a professional will: Identify characteristics and safety of complementary health approaches. Describe specific complementary health approaches. Recognize the importance of being an informed consumer when considering complementary health approaches. Citation: National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. (2023). Pain: Considering Complementary Approaches. The U.S Department of Health and Human Services - National Institutes of Health https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/pain-considering-complementary-approaches-ebook