Christopher Graham

Pain imagery is “like having a picture in your head [of your pain] which may include things you can imagine seeing, hearing or feeling.” Pain imagery may offer a unique insight into a patient’s pain experience. This chapter summarises findings from international pain imagery research in women with endometriosis-associated pain. Endometriosis is a chronic inflammatory condition associated with debilitating pain that affects 5–10% of women of reproductive age worldwide. Our international research has found that pain imagery is experienced by around half of women suffering from endometriosis-associated pain, and is associated with higher levels of catastrophising, depression, and anxiety. However, coping imagery is also reported, and prevalent, at 30%. Pain imagery in women with endometriosis falls into themes: sensory qualities of pain; loss of power or control; attack ; pathology or anatomy envisaged; past or future catastrophe; pain as an object; and abstract images. Imagery content may therefore reveal the meanings of pain or endometriosis to these women. This chapter explores pain imagery content and its personal significance to patients, both for women with endometriosis-associated pain and for patients with other chronic pain conditions. The chapter concludes by discussing the clinical application of imagery, with example patient cases to contextualise the practicalities and therapeutic potential of imagery techniques.Clinical Implications: Pain imagery was reported by half of women with endometriosis-associated pain in our international study and associated with higher levels of catastrophising, depression, and anxiety. Imagery content is extremely varied but can be categorised into themes, which may offer unique insights into each woman’s pain experience. Coping imagery was prevalent at 30%. We believe imagery techniques may be particularly helpful for women with endometriosis-associated pain and discuss these techniques, which should be of interest to professionals involved in pain management.

Experiential evidence shows that pain is associated with common meanings. These include a meaning of threat or danger, which is experienced as immediately distressing or unpleasant; cognitive meanings, which are focused on the long-term consequences of having chronic pain; and existential meanings such as hopelessness, which are more about the person with chronic pain than the pain itself. This interdisciplinary book - the second in the three-volume Meanings of Pain series edited by Dr Simon van Rysewyk - aims to better understand pain by describing experiences of pain and the meanings these experiences hold for the people living through them. The lived experiences of pain described here involve various types of chronic pain, including spinal pain, labour pain, rheumatic pain, diabetic peripheral neuropathic pain, fibromyalgia, complex regional pain syndrome, endometriosis-associated pain, and cancer-related pain. Two chapters provide narrative descriptions of pain, recounted and interpreted by people with pain. Language is important to understanding the meaning of pain since it is the primary tool human beings use to manipulate meaning. As discussed in the book, linguistic meaning may hold clues to understanding some pain-related experiences, including the stigmatisation of people with pain, the dynamics of patient-clinician communication, and other issues, such as relationships between pain, public policy and the law, and attempts to develop a taxonomy of pain that is meaningful for patients. Clinical implications are described in each chapter. This book is intended for people with pain, their family members or caregivers, clinicians, researchers, advocates, and policy makers.