![]() ![]() ![]() Like all chronic diseases, treatment helps but rarely cures. Over time, untreated pain causes visible damage to the brain and spinal cord that maintains the pain. Chronic pain is not protective its intensity bears no relation to tissue injury and may seem to arise in its absence. Thernstrom, however, examines chronic pain, a condition affecting nearly 20 percent of Americans. ![]() Most readers know that pain is a protective reaction to tissue damage that resolves when damage heals, but this only defines acute pain from injuries and self-limited diseases. Searching for relief and understanding, her writing alternates between a frustrating medical odyssey, an overview of pain research and the surprisingly varied meaning of pain throughout history, religion, art and literature. Ten years ago, New York Times Magazine contributor Thernstrom ( Halfway Heaven: Diary of a Harvard Murder, 1997, etc.) noticed severe pain in her neck and shoulder, which came and went but then persisted, sometimes unbearably. ![]() An intriguing investigation of chronic pain that combines expert opinion, philosophy and history with the author's personal struggle. ![]()
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