How Does Chronic Pain Differ In Men And Women?

— -- Question: How Does Chronic Pain Differ In Men And Women?

Answer: Overall, the pain of men and women is very serious. The pain is really a thief in the night. It takes away people's livelihood and ability to work, the ability to participate in their family lives, it has an emotional consequence in that people have post-traumatic stress disorder, they may have experienced anxiety, depression, sleep disturbance as it relates to their pain complaint. That's both men and women.

However, there's specific things that we need to think about as it relates to women. Meaning, women are caregivers for children, for their partner, for their parents. And one thing that we know about women with pain is that they will always take care of those types of roles despite having a significant amount of pain.

We also know that the pain complaints of women may not receive the type of attention that they deserve. When you think about this in the context of several types of pain, problems are more prevalent in women, fibromyalgia, interstitial cystitis, hasn't received the research attention that it deserves or the clinical treatment that it deserves.

So those are things that we definitely think about when we take care of women with chronic pain.

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