How to Treat APS

In a previous post I attached a picture of the front and back side of a body to mark "X"s where the patient is in pain. Once the doctor knows where their patient is in pain they start the recovery process.

If you are diagnosed with APS, pain medicines will not work because your nerves are playing tricks on your mind and you can't fix pain that shouldn't be there.

Now, when a patient is recovering from APS their process is unique to them. But with APS there are three main rehabilitation key points you have to go through to "retrain" the nerves in the body so they don't tell you you're in pain when you shouldn't be.

The main three treatments are physical therapy, managing anxiety, and massage therapy/desensitization. Every time you have an appointment at Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, KS/MO (where I went for help) you meet with several people to address each rehabilitation training.

So, you can go about recovery many different ways depending on the person and their pain.

Breaking it down, physical therapy you do everything that hurts you until it doesn't hurt anymore, this sounds completely insane but it actually works. 

Managing anxiety probably sounds simple to do, but when someone misses school or work it causes a lot of stress on them and it doesn't help their APS. Meeting with a counselor or talking to a close friend to relieve and learn ways to reduce stress is a part of recovering from APS.

Last, but not least massage therapy/desensitization is to reduce pain. Desensitization is the elimination of pain to the touch wherever pain is located. You can rub, pat, brush, or pretty much use anyway that helps desensitize your pained area(s).

At Children's Mercy Hospital they actually have a three to four week Rehabilitation for Amplified Pain Syndrome (RAPS) program. Depending on the patient, the amount of time is not set in stone and it's for them to come to work on themselves if they fail at home to gain progress. When I was told this in my first appointment I was terrified because that meant I would miss three to four weeks of school. On the bright side Children's Mercy works with schools and gets the homework so the child can still get their education while in the program. 

Even though I never had to go into the RAPS program, I still had to work just as hard to get to where I am today. So stick around to learn more about APS and my journey!