Heeding Pain's Prescription

Newer definitions of pain remain suggestive of categorization by mainly neurological or psychological bases. All pain recruits cortical interpretation for any sort of directive effects in awareness, attention, and action. That unity of purpose in pain's multi-pathway manifestations can inspire neurophilosophical reflections on the existentiality, subjectivity, and sociality of pain. Pain is neither so subjective as to be relieved of meaning, nor so objective that multi-modal approaches can take turns at targeting its relief. The problem of objectifying the subjective is essential for addressing issues of assessing and treating pain. Integrative plans for pain care make sense if and when all aspects of pain's character are deemed to be integral, and are actually integrated in both theory in practice. A standpoint on the "entity-identity" of pain afflicting the whole person implies that pain is expressed behaviorally and as articulately as circumstances permit. Pain speaks, even for those not able to speak, as their patterns of brain activity may be representative of pain. Heeding pain's prescriptive voice requires collective interpretations before attempting coordinated treatments. Pain's prescription will remain unfilled until its full reality is recognized at a personal level, where comprehensive care is mobilized for the whole patient. Heeding pain looks to the central figure that is never absent from any painful situation, namely the individual person-in-pain. That holistic and humanistic value to mobilizing resources against pain should be reflected in the practice of pain medicine, and the craft of the pain physician.