Dr. Joe Tatta | The Healing Pain Podcast

In this episode, we're exploring the concept of interoception, and how it impacts both physical and mental well-being. Interoception can be defined as one sense of their internal state of the body. This is a full-body sensory experience that has both a conscious as well as a subconscious or semi-conscious layer to it. As practitioners, we're able to train the sense just as we would train balance or proprioception. Interoception includes the brain's processing of signals relayed up from the body into specific sub-regions of the brain, such as the brainstem, the insula and the somatosensory cortex. This felt a sense of our body, its organs, and all of our physiologic processes allow for specific, as well as subtle or nuanced representation of our emotional and physical state. Interoception is important for maintaining homeostasis in the body. It improves one’s self-awareness or body awareness. It's a critical component of mindfulness training, especially when you're working with body-based conditions, such as r

I had the opportunity to speak on a panel for the development of a new chronic pain app. There were three of us that were practitioners on that panel. It was myself, a social psychologist and our guest, Dr.Natalie Dattilo. We were fielding questions both from people living with pain as well as practitioners. I had the opportunity to get to know Natalie and I wanted to share her with you and introduce you to her because I found her approach to be very refreshing. For me, it was refreshing even though we know that mental health is finally getting the attention it deserves both in pain care and other aspects of illness. What I like about her approach is that she focuses on well-being and resilience. Instead of focusing on what's wrong, she's focusing on what can we improve and how can we improve someone's resiliency so that they can cope and overcome whatever physical or mental health challenge that they're facing. She is a licensed Clinical and Health Psychologist who specializes in the treatment of depression,

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Professor Annette Willgens is going to be sharing some amazing information about mindfulness. I want to share her bio with you before we begin. She is a Clinical Associate Professor at the Doctor of Physical Therapy Program at Temple University. She has over 30 years of experience in both clinical practice as well as educating students and professionals.   Her scholarly agenda, which is what makes me excited, includes studying mindfulness and how it relates to resilience and stress management. Why I love her work so much is because she's working from the inside. She's working inside an active DPT program to educate future DPTs, future physical therapists, and oftentimes other health professionals that she works with on an interprofessional basis in the university setting.   Mindfulness is important for lots of different physical as well as mental health conditions. It is not being taught so much in PT school. We're excited to share this information with you. I'm personally excited to share her with you. I lov

This was a fun episode for me for lots of different reasons. The first reason, I spent a lot of time over past episodes talking about cognitive-behavioral therapies, in essence, if you will, the more top-down approaches for the treatment of chronic pain as well as other health conditions. Being a physical therapist, I work with both the mind as well as the body. I want to turn some attention toward more of the embodied therapies, more of the bottom-up approaches, and how they can have a very positive influence and impact on someone's pain and their overall health. In this episode, we are going to discuss awareness through movement and how the Feldenkrais Method can be used as a tool for pain management. My guest for this episode is Professor Teresa Miller. She is the Founding DPT Program Director at St. John's University, a graduate of the American Physical Therapy Association Educational Leadership Fellowship, and a Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner. She is an Associate Professor Emeritus from State U

Friends, thanks for joining me on this episode. I am speaking with Physical Therapist Zachary Stearns about how to screen for psychological factors when treating patients with chronic pain. Zachary is a physical therapist in Durham, North Carolina. He's board-certified in Orthopedic Physical Therapy and has worked in outpatient clinics, which have a focus on musculoskeletal pain management. He's currently working on a large research study, which is called the AIM-back program. This is a collaborative effort between Duke University and the U.S Department of Veterans Affairs. He's also a PhD student in Health Sciences. In this episode, we discuss the benefits of screening for psychological factors or what we call “yellow flags” in chronic pain management. What types of screening tools can you use? Self-report measures that you can use in your practice. As physical medicine professionals, should we be screening for suicidality? If we do have a positive screening, how do we approach that? How do we follow through

In this episode, we have two incredible guests. I'm excited to bring two guests with some incredible experience and research behind them to talk about an important topic, which is bringing ACT to a multidisciplinary pain clinic setting. My guests are Physical Therapist Corinne Cooley and Psychologist Heather King. First, I'll tell you about Corinne. She is a Physical Therapist at the Stanford Pain Management Center and a Clinical Residency Faculty Member in the Stanford Orthopaedic Clinical Residency Program in California. She works with pain physicians and pain psychologists to help optimize complex patient care plans, and leads the exercise and movement portion of interdisciplinary outpatient programs.   Psychologist, Heather King, is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology and Peri-Operative Pain Medicine. She also serves as the Director of the Pain Psychology Fellowship at Stanford. Her areas of expertise are Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for pain as well as insomnia, and Accepta

In this episode, we're tackling the important but often times not spoken about the impact of trauma and PTSD on the experience of chronic pain. We're going to be sharing a masterclass that was delivered by a physical therapist, Dr. Jeremy Fletcher, on the topic of trauma-informed pain care and why all of us as healthcare professionals should be more sensitive to the needs of people living with trauma and PTSD. Jeremy does share a number of slides. It's got some great data and some beautiful slides to share with everyone.   Let me tell you a little bit about Jeremy before we begin this episode. Jeremy is a Physical Therapist and serves as the Director of Community Integration for a company called Veterans Recovery Resources. This is a non-profit mental health organization, which is located in Mobile, Alabama. He is a former Professor of Physical Therapy. He's also presented at state, national, and international conferences on the topic of chronic pain, health behavior trauma, as well as community health. He's

The month of September is Pain Awareness Month. In years past, I've done lots of different things for Pain Awareness Month. I've held online summits, which hosted 30 plus experts. I've done courses for professionals and people with pain. In 2021, I was trying to figure out, "What are we not talking about in the chronic pain space that we need to bring more awareness around? What should we be talking about? What can we bring some more disruption around to disrupt our pain care world out there that isn't always as effective for people with chronic pain?" As I started to reflect on my practice and the patients I've seen over many years I've been treating patients looking at research, I said, "We need to talk more about the link between trauma and chronic pain." This September, I've done a couple of different things to raise awareness around the trauma-pain connection. The first is I've done lots of different posts on my Instagram handle. If you can head on over to Instagram and find me, my handle is easy. It's @

As always, it's an honor and a pleasure to be spending this time with you. Before we begin, there are a couple of thank yous as we move forward. I wanted to thank OPTP Products for hosting me on their webinar, which was on September 16th. I conducted a webinar for them on mindfulness and acceptance-based approaches for the treatment of chronic pain. Also, I talked about some information from my latest book, Radical Relief, which you can find on their website as well. Thank you for all the great people at OPTP. Make sure you check them out on their website, which is OPTP.com.   On October 21st, I'll be giving a two-hour session on mindfulness and acceptance-based approaches for the treatment of chronic pain at the New York Physical Therapy Association Annual Conference. I hope to see you there. I also want to thank the NYPTA for inviting me. Finally, you can catch me and our guest in this episode at The 2021 Educational Leadership Conference in Atlanta, Georgia. The Excellence in Physical Therapy Education Con

We have an incredible guest and we're discussing ways to heal and prevent common childhood diseases. Our guest is an ear for parents, a voice for children, a resource for other healthcare professionals, and she's on a mission to help one million children get off meds. They may not need it if they were eating the right food for their health system. My guest is Dr. Sheila Kilbane. She is a board-certified pediatrician. Who's also trained in integrative medicine. She practices medicine in Charlotte, North Carolina, and consults with physicians around the globe using her holistic strategies to help parents resolve eight chronic recurring health conditions. Dr. Kilbane, welcome to the show.   Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share! Here’s How »   Join the Healing Pain Podcast Community today: integrativepainsciencinstitute.com Healing Pain Podcast Facebook Healing Pain Podcast Twitter Healing Pain Podcast YouTube Healing Pain Podcast LinkedIn Healing Pain Podcast Instagram

By now, you know that I'm a big fan of mindfulness and acceptance-based approaches for the treatment of chronic pain and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one. If you look at studies, an increasing number of Americans are using some type of integrative or contemplative practice on a daily or a weekly basis to improve upon their physical health, as well as their mental health.   One of the reasons why I love mindfulness and acceptance-based approach so much is because, as practitioners, we're faced with an increasingly complex, more chronic, and more disease professional landscape. The other reason is I believe we've arrived at a place where we can no longer separate the brain from the body or the mind from the body, however you'd like to look at it. Consider for a moment that there's a well-known, backed by evidence and science, strong positive association between living in a state of stress, which then turns into emotional distress and then finally, on to mental illness. There's a bi-directional relationship

Thanks for joining us. My guest is Mathew Embry. Mathew has a great story of overcoming adversity and a chronic condition. Mathew was diagnosed with a debilitating form of progressive MS where he was offered no cure and few if any solutions. He and his father, who is a PhD trained researcher, set out on a quest to find answers. They dove into the peer-reviewed medical literature and discovered natural ways to halt and reverse the progression of multiple sclerosis. His entire journey can be found in the Amazon documentary called Living Proof, where Mathew shares his story of halting the progression of MS. The documentary also explores the relationship between MS charities and the pharmaceutical industry, their lack of transparency with regard to medical funding, as well as their power, influence, and sometimes their ability to avoid opportunities to raise awareness around lifestyle-based treatments such as nutrition and exercise therapy for the treatment of MS. We discussed this story and how potential conflic

In this episode, we are discussing the impact of the health insurance industry on the effective treatment of chronic pain. This is a topic I have been wanting to create some content around for some time. When I look back at the evolution of the show, the episodes typically fall into two buckets. I'm either talking about effective treatments, trying to build, spread awareness around conservative effective treatments for chronic pain or I'm talking about the latest, or some new research that I feel is innovative. In those two buckets, I'm also always looking for where are the problems and the barriers for us as professionals and for people living with pain to access effective pain care. When I look at the problems, there's one big problem that is like a big flashing red light, the elephant in the room. That's the health insurance industry. I asked myself, "How has this changed throughout my career?" As a physical therapist, I started practicing or treating patients in 1997. In 1997, I can't think of too many ba

We're talking about analgesic medications and how they can have both a positive and a negative impact on how your muscles function. Analgesic medications are simply medicines that are used to alleviate pain. You may have seen them marketed as painkillers or pain relievers. Technically the term analgesic refers to any medication that provides pain relief without putting you to sleep or causing you to lose consciousness. There are many different types of medications that have pain, relieving properties. Some people tend to lump these all together, but they're different groups or types of medications.   Some common names you might have heard of are non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medications, such as NSAIDs. These include things like Aleve and Advil. Another group is narcotic opioids, like oxycodone and morphine, and then another common group or non-opioid analgesics typically falls into that category are things like acetaminophen or Tylenol. In many cases, the effect of treatment of chronic pain may include one

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In this episode, we're discussing how to bridge the gap that exists between a person and pain, their ability to move beyond suffering and back to life through applying both modern pain science principles, and the ancient wisdom of yoga. Yoga is a practice that is more than 5,000 years old, and the field of pain science is probably more than 40 years old. However, when brought together, both of these methods and techniques offer each other enormous resources and wisdom for the treatment of pain and many other chronic health conditions. Joining me to discuss the combination of pain neuroscience with yoga for effective pain care are physical therapists Niamh Moloney and Marnie Hartman. Niamh is a physiotherapist, pain researcher, and yoga teacher. Marnie is a physical therapist, a certified strength and conditioning specialist, and a registered yoga teacher. Both have a special interest in pain neuroscience and how to use yoga for effective pain care. In this episode, we discuss how to apply modern pain or scien

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On this episode, we're discussing patient adherence to treatment as a foundational aspect of pain management. The evidence-base and research in this era tell us that high levels of adherence to things like physical activity or perhaps an exercise program are highly correlated with positive health outcomes, but what about when a patient does not adhere to the agreed upon treatment plan? Do we know how to increase patient adherence? Do we know how to promote the maintenance of pain self-management behaviors? Joining me to discuss adherence to and the maintenance of self-management behaviors in people with musculoskeletal pain is Dr. Anne Soderlund. Anne is a Professor of Physiotherapy in Sweden with a special interest in behavioral medicine.   Her research area is on prevention, treatment and evaluation of health problems from a behavioral medicine perspective embedded within a physiotherapy framework. This includes a strong focus on an individual's behavior, behavior change, and the ability for functioning in