Pain Rehabilitation

Sometimes pain can be a barrier which can slow or stall someone’s overall progress. The Pain Rehabilitation Service is for anyone who is struggling to achieve their goals due to pain. It is effective at any stage after an illness or injury where pain is a barrier to recovery.

Pain education and rehabilitation can assist people to understand how and why pain occurs, the protective function of pain and the specific factors that influence their individual experience of pain.  This can assist people in reducing their pain levels, gaining a sense of control over their lives and reduced perception of disability.                                                                                                                                                                               

We promote an active approach to pain management, incorporating a graduated approach to increasing movement and cognitive strategies to minimise flare ups and maximise participation in daily life activities. Most participants notice an increase in function and decrease in overall pain levels as they learn to use active pain management strategies.

We provide our Pain Education programs individually, with 1:1 meetings with one of our clinicians who is trained in Pain Science and Graded Motor Imagery.  Our clinicians keep up to date with the latest research, attend regular training to update their skills and utilise resources such as ‘Explain Pain’ and ‘Protectometer’ in addition to a range of video and multimedia resources with clients. Graded Motor Imagery, including mirror box therapy is utilised as appropriate for individual clients.

For additional information on some of the resources we commonly use, see our Pain Education resources.

There are three phases to our program, however sessions are tailored to the individual as outlined below.

Phase 1: Assessment

This service begins with a biopsychosocial intake assessment, enabling us to gain a comprehensive understanding of each client’s pain experience, current knowledge, tolerances, and goals. From this, we tailor an individualised treatment plan.

Phase 2: Pain Education

Treatment typically commences with pain education, informed by contemporary research and key publications such as Explain Pain (Butler & Moseley, 2013) and related literature. Tools such as the Protectometer (Butler & Moseley, 2015) are often used to support learning. The aim of this phase is to:

• Enhance health literacy
• Reconceptualise pain
• Reduce the perceived threat value of pain
• Promote sustainable self-management strategies

Phase 3: Graded Motor Imagery (GMI)

When indicated, treatment progresses to GMI based strategies to improve bodily awareness and functional outcomes. These strategies may include left/right discrimination tasks, imagined movements, and mirror therapy to address cortical changes. We also collaborate closely with physical therapists, whether part of a client’s existing care team or external providers to help guide movement exposure. This interdisciplinary approach consolidates learning and ensures practical application of new skills.

Other content that will generally be covered includes:

• The purpose and function of pain – pain as the brain’s response to perceived threat;
• DIMs and SIMs – Danger signals and Safety signals – how to identify them and utilise this to reduce pain to a manageable level
• Sleep – particularly the relationship between poor sleep and increased pain, and practical strategies to improve sleep patterns;
• Stress – the impact of increased stress on a person’s experience of pain, and a variety of strategies to reduce stress;
• Healthy lifestyle – the importance of healthy diet and exercise;
• Neuroplasticity and retraining the brain.

Referrals

To make a referral please contact our administration team on (08) 8293 6783 or via email: admin@adaptivews.com.au

We run an extended session for this service of 90 minutes, to ensure sufficient time to work through the content which is often very new to clients and challenging to their existing knowledge about their pain. A 90 minute session provides time to utilise constructivist learning principles to explore ideas together with the client and work through any resistance or uncertainty to the information which has been provided. We would generally recommend 10 sessions as a good starting point, some client may require the full 10 sessions and some may not however, we can discuss this as the service progresses.

We will accept referrals via the ReturntoWorkSA fee schedule services as necessary.