PAINS IN PRACTICE AND THEORY.

Hokitika Guardian, 22 March 1930, Page 3

PAINS IN PRACTICE AND THEORY.

“To the i practitioner of- medicine pain presents itself in a very practical. fashion ; . it creates a situation which demands attention and will not brook delay,” says the .“British .Modical- Journal.’’ “Neither the doctor nor the victim, at least for the, moment, i.s . interested in speculations about,thy .protective value of pain or about the part it lias played in , the Evolution of the race; and,' equally, disquisitions dealing with the benefit of pain as an instrument of moral discipline' or with its philosophical meaning are, at such times, mere impertinent and even irritating irrelevancies. Upon all these aspects of pain much has been said and written from the comfortable shelter of the easy chair. Yet when put to the question by toothache not even a philosopher can endure it patiently, lie lief is the demand of the sufferer, not,dissertations, arid to this demand the doctor must needs apply himself,

although in doing So he has to remember a wider claim. For,- of course, behind pain is a cause, and it may. •well.. be that to detect and muuy'c this cause is the only abiding method of securing relief, i ■ Jri sfioia; p-.iii as a clinical event asks' both lor diagnostic interpretation and lor' a scim.-ie pf, effective treatment.”