Pain Science

Catalog description

Persistent pain affects 100 million Americans each year, and accounts for hundreds of billions of dollars in health care costs. Despite its profound impact, persistent pain is poorly understood and poorly managed across medical disciplines. In 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released the National Pain Strategy, which exposed a key reason for poor understanding and management of persistent pain: 'Most health care professions' education programs devote little time to education and training about pain and pain care.' In this course, learners gain a robust theoretical foundation to understand pain through the lens of biological, physiological, psychological, cognitive, social, and cultural factors. At the completion of the course, learners will have the skills to not only comprehensively assess pain and its influences, but to initiate evidence-based pain modulatory interventions which future Duke DPT courses will build upon. Importantly, course content is annually revised to align with current guidelines from the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP) and cutting-edge pain research.