Basak Gurbuz Derman/Getty
WHEN pain lasts for three months or longer, it is classified as chronic, a condition that affects .
Chronic pain was long believed to be a stubborn version of acute pain – which passes in less than three months once the damage is healed – and it was treated in much the same way. Yet an increasing body of research has led doctors to believe that chronic pain should be treated as a disease in its own right, rather than an enduring symptom of tissue damage or physical trauma. This could have major implications for the treatment…