Arthritis that affects your “shock absorbers” is the cause of pain and disability in knee and hip joints that can lead to surgery.

The causes of back pain can be complex — accidents, muscle strains, sports injuries. Stiffness, pain, lower back pain, and pain radiating down the leg are symptoms of back pain.

Overexertion, pinched nerves — all sorts of joint and muscle problems can cause neck and shoulder pain. Click here to read more about how shoulder and neck pain are diagnosed and treated.

A car accident or any abrupt jerking motion to the head and neck — and suddenly you have serious neck, shoulder, back pain. Standard X-rays of the neck may not show any injuries. Read more about whiplash.

Use your muscles incorrectly, too much, too little — and you’ve got muscle pain. Learn the subtle differences of muscle injuries and pain.

Overuse injuries — muscle sprains, strains, and pains — result from all sorts of assaults, small to severe. Read more about the causes of muscle pain and treatment of muscle pain.

Problems of the jaw, jaw joint, and facial muscles that control chewing — those are signs of TMD disorders. But facial pain is just one symptom.

It’s considered one of the most painful conditions in medicine. The face pain it causes can be treated. Learn more about what causes trigeminal neuralgia and treatments for face pain caused by it.

A complication of shingles is the painful after-effects known as postherpetic neuralgia. This condition occurs only in some people and after the rash of shingles has disappeared.

When your rear or leg muscles worsen when sitting for a long period of time, climbing stairs, walking, or running — it might be sciatica.

Inflamed tissue, which surrounds the spinal cord — caused by injury, infection, or other assaults — can cause great disability and pain.

It’s a baffling, intensely painful disorder that can develop from a seemingly minor injury, yet is believed to result from high levels of nerve impulses being sent to the affected disorder.

A stroke, multiple sclerosis, or spinal cord injuries can result in chronic pain and burning syndromes from damage to brain regions.

Phantom pain refers to the sensation of pain felt by patients who have had a limb amputated. Treatments are usually disappointing and do not provide relief.

If you have diabetes, nerve damage can be a serious complication. This nerve complication can cause severe burning pain especially at night.

Depression, Anxiety & Pain

Depression, anxiety, and other emotional problems can cause pain — or make existing pain worse.

Other Type Defination methods:

There are three types of pain, based on where in the body the pain is felt: somatic, visceral, and neuropathic. Pain of all three types can be either acute or chronic. Somatic, visceral, and neuropathic pain can all be felt at the same time or singly and at different times. Most cancer patients experience both somatic and visceral pain. Only about 15–20% of all cancer patients report neuropathic pain. The different types of pain respond differently to the various pain management therapies. Somatic and visceral pain are both easier to manage than neuropathic pain.

Somatic Pain

Somatic pain is caused by the activation of pain receptors in either the cutaneous (body surface) or deep tissues (musculoskeletal tissues).

When it occurs in the musculoskeletal tissues, it is called deep somatic pain. Common causes of somatic cancer pain include metastasis in the bone (an example of deep somatic pain) and postsurgical pain from a surgical incision (an example of surface pain). Deep somatic pain is usually described as dull or aching but localized. Surface somatic pain is usually sharper and may have a burning or pricking quality.

Visceral Pain

“Viscera” refers to the internal areas of the body that are enclosed within a cavity. Visceral pain is caused by activation of pain receptors resulting from infiltration, compression, extension, or stretching of the thoracic (chest), abdominal, or pelvic viscera. Common causes of visceral pain include pancreatic cancer and metastases in the abdomen. Visceral pain is not well localized and is usually described as pressure-like, deep squeezing.

Neuropathic Pain

Neuropathic pain is caused by injury to the nervous system either as a result of a tumor compressing nerves or the spinal cord, or cancer actually infiltrating the nerves or spinal cord. It also results from chemical damage to the nervous system that may be caused by cancer treatment (chemotherapy, radiation, surgery). This type of pain is severe and usually described as burning or tingling. Tumors that lie close to neural structures are believed to cause the most severe pain that cancer patients feel.

Acute Pain

Acute pain is short lasting and usually manifests in ways that can be easily described and observed. It may, for example, cause sweating or increased heart rate. It can last for several days, increasing in intensity over time (subacute pain), or it can occur intermittently (episodic or intermittent pain).

Chronic Pain

Chronic pain is defined as pain lasting for more than 3 months. It is much more subjective and not as easily described as acute pain. Effectively treating chronic pain poses a great challenge for physicians. This kind of pain usually affects a person’s life in many ways. It can change someone’s personality, ability to function, and quality of life.

According to the American Cancer Society, chronic cancer pain often involves persistent pain and breakthrough pain. Persistent pain is continuous and may last all day. Breakthrough pain is a brief flare-up of severe pain that occurs even while the patient is regularly taking pain medication. It usually comes on quickly and may last from a few minutes to an hour. Many patients experience a number of episodes of breakthrough pain each day.

Breakthrough cancer pain can result from the cancer or cancer treatment, or it may occur during a certain activity (e.g., walking, dressing, coughing). It also can occur unexpectedly, without a preceding incident or clear cause. Breakthrough pain usually is treated with strong, short-acting pain medications that work faster than persistent pain medications.

There are two major types of pain, nociceptive and neuropathic. Distinguishing between them is important because the causes and treatments are different. Ideally, the causes of both types of pain will be identified and treated, resulting in pain relief. Unfortunately, it is often the case that cure is impossible and palliation is necessary.

Nociceptive (Tissue) Pain

Nociceptive pain results from tissue damage. Intact neurons dutifully report damage, and pain is experienced. Nociceptive pain can be subdivided into somatic and visceral (gut) pain. Nociceptive pain can be experienced as sharp, dull, or aching. There may be radiation of the pain, especially visceral pain, but it will not be in a direct nerve distribution. For example, gallbladder pain can radiate to the scapula. Nociceptive pain is generally responsive to NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) and opioids. Conditions associated with inflammation, bone pain, and joint disease are particularly responsive to NSAIDs.

Neuropathic (Nerve) Pain

Neuropathic> pain may occur when there is either damage to or dysfunction of nerves in the peripheral or central nervous system. Faulty signals are sent to the brain and experienced as pain. Neuropathic pain can be either peripheral (outside the central nervous system) or central in origin. Examples of neuropathic pain include diabetic neuropathy, trigeminal neuralgia, postherpetic zoster pain (peripheral pains), and the thalamic pain syndrome (a central pain). Neuropathic pain frequently coexists with nociceptive pain. Examples include trauma that damages tissue and nerves, burns (that burn skin as well as nerve endings), and external nerve compression. Examples of the latter include tumor nerve compression and sciatica from herniated discs pressing on nerves.

Neuropathic pain is often described as having a burning or electrical quality. It may feel like a shock or lightning bolt. Sometimes stimuli that usually do not cause pain, such as light touch, may elicit a paroxysm of pain. A light stroke of the cheek that results in the sudden pain of trigeminal neuralgia is an example of this type of pain. Sometimes patients do not describe the sensation as being “painful” but rather as feeling unpleasantly strange or tingly, like an arm feels when it wakes up from “going to sleep.” This is called a dysesthesia. Diabetic neuropathy commonly results in this type of sensation.

Neuropathic pain in the peripheral nervous system frequently follows a nerve distribution. This distribution may replicate a particular nerve, as in sciatic pain or trigeminal neuralgia, or may represent the distribution of terminal nerve endings, as in the stocking-glove distribution of peripheral neuropathies.

Neuropathic pain is relatively resistant to NSAIDs and opioids, although they may be helpful in certain cases. The other major classes of medications useful for neuropathic pain, tricyclic antidepressants, anticonvulsants, and sodium channel blockers