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Originally Posted by catkanger
Is this classed as chronic?
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In relation to this part of your question I have found a nice overview of the definitions of acute, subacute and chronic pain as it relates to Low Back Pain. The neck would be considered in a similar fashion. Others may have further information but perhaps this is a starting point for you.
Acute, Subacute, And Chronic
There are many ways in which the terms - acute, subacute, and chronic, are used and defined. Some definitions gravitate to chronic pain being characterised by the degree of unrelenting suffering. However, the traditional and most common definitions are based on time. That system of definition is used for present purposes.
The International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP) recognises chronic pain, in general, as any pain that has persisted for longer than three months; although for research purposes, it prefers six months as the defining period.
By implication, acute pain is pain that has lasted for less than three months.
Some authorities use an additional term - subacute pain, to refer to pain that has persisted for longer than a brief period but not yet three months. Different authorities use different critical periods, but the one that has dominated the literature on back pain is five to seven weeks.
Accordingly for present purposes, the definitions are:- Chronic low back pain Low back pain that has been present for at least three months
- Acute low back pain Low back pain that has been present for less than three months
- Subacute low back pain Low back pain that has been present for longer than five to seven weeks but not longer than 12 weeks
Under those definitions, subacute low back pain is a subset of acute low back pain, and consequently falls under the terms of reference of these guidelines. The distinctions between acute, subacute, and chronic low back pain are important because the biological basis, natural history, and response to therapy are different for each category.
What is difficult to define are the entities of recurrent low back pain, and acute on chronic back pain. In these presentations, the patient does not suffer persistent or continuous pain, but has a period relatively free of pain but punctuated by episodes that, in a different context, would constitute acute back pain.
When a patient suffers recurrent episodes of pain, but each is separated by a pain-free period of at least three months, each episode satisfies the definition of acute low back pain.
When a patient suffers a continuous, or essentially continuous, but low level of back pain punctuated by exacerbations of pain (each of which might be referred to as "acute"), the patient is most comfortably defined as having chronic back pain, on the grounds that the adjectives - acute or chronic, refer to the duration of pain, not its severity.
Episodes of pain that recur within periods less than three months in duration do not lend themselves to classification as acute or chronic. These are perhaps best defined as recurrent back pain, with the descriptors - acute or chronic, being promoted to defining the length of period over which the recurrences have occurred.
This information was sourced from the Australasian Faculty of Musculoskeletal Medicine: Acute Low Back Pain Guide
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