Nonpharmacologic pain management in arthritis

This article has presented the critical elements of arthritic pain, the role of nonpharmacologic pain management, and a selection of techniques for therapeutic pain management. The author believes that these techniques are particularly suited to nursing intervention. Nursing is concerned with the total person and nonpharmacological techniques involve the total person in developing self-help coping strategies. The nurse interested in pursuing nonpharmacologic pain management techniques will find the outline, with explanation of "Skill Training: Summary of Training for Role Playing" to be particularly helpful. Further reading will enable the nurse to become familiar with and to pursue interventions of particular interest.