Responding Wisely to Persistent Pain: Insights from Patristic Theology and Clinical Experience
For most of the past generation, clinicians have been taught to treat patients' pain until the patient says it is relieved. The opioid crisis has forced both clinicians and patients to reconsider that approach. This essay considers how Christians in particular might assume and seek to overcome...
| Subtitles: | "Attending to Persons in Pain and Modern Health Care" |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Oxford University Press
2023
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| In: |
Christian bioethics
Year: 2023, Volume: 29, Issue: 3, Pages: 196-206 |
| IxTheo Classification: | CB Christian life; spirituality KAB Church history 30-500; early Christianity NBE Anthropology NCH Medical ethics |
| Further subjects: | B
Pain
B Medicalization B Church Fathers B Suffering B Chronic Pain |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | For most of the past generation, clinicians have been taught to treat patients' pain until the patient says it is relieved. The opioid crisis has forced both clinicians and patients to reconsider that approach. This essay considers how Christians in particular might assume and seek to overcome their experiences of persistent pain. Wise and faithful responses to pain, especially chronic pain, can take their bearings from how early Christians made sense of the place of both medicine and suffering in a faithful life. This results in not asking medicine to resolve persistent pain, especially not through the use of opioids. Resisting the impulse to medicalize chronic pain will require patience on the part of those who suffer, and both patience and fortitude on the part of the clinicians to whom they present. |
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| ISSN: | 1744-4195 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Christian bioethics
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1093/cb/cbad020 |