How To Classify Pain?

Multiple systems for classifying pain exist. These include multidimensional classification systems, such as the IASP Classification of Chronic Pain, and a variety of systems based on a single dimension of the pain experience. Of the latter systems, those based on pain duration (i.e., acute vs. chronic pain) and underlying pathophysiology (i.e., nociceptive vs. neuropathic pain) are used most often.¹

Acute Pain

Acute pain was once defined simply in terms of duration. It is now viewed as a “complex, unpleasant experience with emotional and cognitive, as well as sensory, features that occur in response to tissue trauma.”¹

Pain Chronification

There has been a widely accepted notion that the transition from acute to chronic pain follows a linear trajectory, where an injury leads to acute episodes, subacute stages, and progresses to a chronic pain condition. However, it appears that pain progression is much more complicated and individualized than this original unsupported assumption.²

Chronic Pain

Chronic primary pain is chosen when pain has persisted for more than 3 months and is associated with significant emotional distress and/or functional disability, and the pain is not better accounted for by another condition.³

How To Classify Pain?

Acute Pain

Pain Chronification

Chronic Pain

References