cover image DOCTORS' GUIDE TO CHRONIC PAIN: The Newest, Quickest, and Most Effective Ways to Find Relief

DOCTORS' GUIDE TO CHRONIC PAIN: The Newest, Quickest, and Most Effective Ways to Find Relief

Richard Laliberte, . . Reader's Digest, $26.95 (272pp) ISBN 978-0-7621-0468-0

More than 50 million Americans suffer from chronic pain, says the author of this book on conventional and alternative treatments for pain, and 25 million more experience acute pain each year. If those sufferers are patient enough to wade through the sea of extraneous information and redundancies at the beginning of this book, they'll be pleased to find easy to implement self-care tips, medical measures and complimentary options on ailments ranging from arthritis to chronic fatigue syndrome, neck pain to premenstrual syndrome. There's a particularly helpful discussion of various drug treatments including NSAIDs (like ibuprofen and naproxen), acetaminophens (like Tylenol) and opioids (such as codeine and morphine). Laliberte, a freelance health writer, also addresses the "mind over matter" aspects of pain, explaining, "[H]ow you handle your feelings can make a difference in how much you suffer," before discussing yoga and other "tension-taming tactics." The chapter on "Getting Physical" offers instruction on such therapies as exercise, massage, whirlpools, electrical stimulation and ultrasound. This general book contains a wealth of information for pain sufferers, and the sidebars, illustrations and glossary add further value. (Mar.)