PubMed Health⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

S Aldrich

Publications and source records attributed to S Aldrich.

9 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

Worry and chronic pain patients: a description and analysis of individual differences.

Patients with chronic pain often report negative and aversive rumination about pain and its consequences. Little is known about how and why patients with chronic pain worry. This study provides a description of worrying by chronic pain patients. Eighteen female and 16 male chronic pain patients reported, over a 7-day period, their experience of pain-related and non-pain-related worry. Results indicated that, in comparison with non-pain related worry, worry about chronic pain is experienced as more difficult to dismiss, more distracting, more attention grabbing, more intrusive, more distressing and less pleasant. Further analyses suggest that these characteristics of worry about chronic pain do not arise from a general disposition to worry or from a general disposition to anxiety. Worry is, however, related to awareness of somatic sensations. These results are discussed within an attentional model in which worry functions to maintain vigilance to threat.

Adult↗
PubMed2000

Worrying about chronic pain: vigilance to threat and misdirected problem solving.

Worry is reviewed to inform a cognitive-behavioural understanding of chronic pain. How worry comes to dominate is discussed as 'vigilance' and why worry comes to dominate is discussed as 'problem solving'. These two aspects are applied to worrying about chronic pain. Chronic pain is re-presented as chronic vigilance to threat that may lead to a perservation of attempts at solving the problem of achieving escape from pain. Attempts will be frustrated by the insolubility of the problem of chronic pain. The clinical and theoretical implications of this application are discussed.

Anxiety↗
PubMed2000

Making sense of everyday pain.

A social constructionist analysis is reported of how sense is made of everyday pain. Q factor analysis is used within a critical framework as Q methodology. Sixty-one participants completed the procedure. Eight factors or accounts of everyday pain were derived. These are reported as pain as malfunction, pain as self-growth, pain as spiritual growth, pain as alien invasion, pain as coping and control, pain as abuse, pain as homeostatic mechanism and pain and power. Common to all of the accounts is the theme of how pain relates to self, and in particular, of whether pain can change self. This theme is expanded and discussed in terms of how self is protected and legitimated in a context of pain as a fundamental threat. Implications of this study for how to understand the experience of 'abnormal' pain are discussed, as are possible new research routes.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1997

Attention and somatic awareness in chronic pain.

Empirical methods are used to explore the relationship between chronic pain, somatic awareness and attention. Using a primary task paradigm, 46 chronic pain patients performed an attentionally demanding task. Patients were classified according to self reported pain intensity and the extent of their reporting of the perception of bodily sensations (somatic awareness). Results showed that, as predicted, disruption of attentional performance was most pronounced in those who reported high pain intensity and high somatic awareness. Further analysis revealed that these patients also reported high negative affect. These findings are discussed in terms of their theoretical implications for the concept of hypervigilance and their clinical implications for chronic pain control.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Differential effects of alpha-adrenergic antagonists on tonic immobility in domestic fowl.

Groups of young chickens were injected with various dosages of several alpha-adrenergic antagonists and tested for the effects of these drugs on tonic immobility. Yohimbine, a very potent alpha2 antagonist, produced a significant decrease in the duration of tonic immobility at doses of 1 mg/kg, while prazosin, a potent alpha1 antagonist, had no apparent effect on immobility duration. Phentolamine, a on-specific alpha antagonist, produced a significant decrease in the duration of immobility at doses of 0.1 mg/kg, but had no effect at higher or lower doses. These results support the involvement of the alpha-adrenergic system with the duration of the tonic immobility reflex, but at the same time they also suggest that alpha2 receptors are more closely involved with the immobility response than alpha1 receptors. However, none of these drugs had any apparent effect on the initial susceptibility of subjects to the immobility reflex, as measured by the number of inductions required to produce tonic immobility.

Adrenergic alpha-Antagonists↗
PubMed1978

Drug abuse and suicide.

This paper examines the relationship between drug abuse and suicide. It attempts to assess the extent of suicidal thoughts or behaviors among a group of drug abusers. The research examines variables related to self-destructive or self-endangering behaviors, such as accidental overdoses, arrests for driving under the influence, and auto accidents in which the subject was the driver. These data were examined in relation to reports of suicidal thoughts and actual suicide attempts. The results indicate a suicide attempt rate at least 12 times greater than expected for the general population. The results also indicate significant correlations between suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts, suicidal thoughts and nonsuicidal overdoses, and arrests for driving under the influece of drugs or alcohol and nonsuicidal overdoses. The implications of these results along with the role of depression as discussed.

Accidents, Traffic↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Health care legislation: the outlook for 1995.

With Republicans now in charge of Congress, the federal health care debate is sure to shift focus. Here's a look at "incremental" proposals that could surface--and the potential impact on health plans' ability to provide high quality, cost-effective care.

Child↗