The Effectiveness of Rescripting of Pain Mental Imagery on Pain Intensity in Patients with Chronic Pain

Abstract

Introduction: Pain-related mental images have an important role in pain experience of the patients and processing of sensory information through cognitive and emotional processes. The treatment protocol for rescripting of pain mental image has recently been complied and validated in order to change the pain perception. This study has been conducted aimed to determine the efficacy of rescripting of pain mental image on the severity of perceived pain by the patients with chronic pain. Method: this is an empirical study with pre-test, posttest and follow-up stages, conducted on an experiment and a control group. Sampling was done randomly from among the patients with chronic pain who referred to the Specialized Clinic of Pain in Labafinejad Hospital of Tehran. With regard to inclusion and exclusion criteria, 50 subjects were selected and randomly assigned to two groups. Data were analyzed via Variance analysis within and between groups. Results: The results of this study show that rescripting of pain mental image has been effective in the reduction of pain intensity of the patients with chronic pain (P: 0.001, α2 : 0.58). Conclusion: Rescripting of pain mental image can be presented as a compact and short-term psychological intervention which may be easily combined with pharmaceutical and physical therapy programs to reduce pain of the patients with chronic pain.