| Gatchel and Turk (1996) report that pain is the impetus for over 80% of physician visits and Curtis (2001) estimates that approximately {dollar}100 billion a year is spent on chronic pain. However, traditional pain treatments such as surgery and pharmacology have met with limited success (Gatchel & Weisberg, 2000). This has led to continued investigations into non-traditional pain interventions including explorations of how psychological variables may impact on the etiology and treatment of pain syndromes (Gatchel & Weisberg, 2000).; In particular, there is a significant body of literature positing psychoanalytic explanations for pain (Engel, 1959; Szasz, I988). Psychoanalytic theories of pain etiology are tied together by the common notion that somatic pain is a “converted” expression of repressed emotional disturbance that is too unbearable for the patient to process consciously (Gamsa, I994). It follows that interventions designed to help patients de-repress and more fully experience this emotional turmoil may help to alleviate pain (Sarno, I998).; The present study explored the relationship between emotional repression and chronic back pain in 62 pre-treatment only and 47 pre/post treatment patients undergoing an eight-week psychodynamic group psychotherapy intervention for their back pain. The group was based on Davanloo's (1986) therapeutic model which emphasizes the importance of helping patients to experience their feelings to the fullest extent they can tolerate. Participants completed measures of pain, repression and anxiety and answered questions exploring their sociodemographic background, medical history, and attitudes toward pain and pain treatment.; Results indicated that there were, in fact, no relationships between repression and baseline pain intensity, repression and treatment outcome, or pre-to post-treatment changes in repression and pre- to post-treatment changes in pain. Moreover, although the psychotherapy group was intended to encourage emotional expression, no pre- to post-treatment changes in repression were discovered. There was however, a highly significant reduction in pain scores from pre- to post-treatment. Recommendations for further research exploring the repression/pain relationship are made. |
