Chronic pain is a widespread and serious condition that often doesn’t get the attention and care it deserves. It’s estimated that around 43% of UK adults experience chronic pain, making it one of the country’s most common long-term health conditions.

Unlike short-term pain caused by an injury or illness, chronic pain can persist for months or even years, affecting your ability to work, exercise, sleep, and enjoy everyday life. It can take a significant toll on your emotional and mental wellbeing.

At Ramsay Health Care, we take chronic pain seriously. Our experienced pain specialists can provide expert assessment and diagnosis to understand the sources of your pain, and can develop a personalised treatment plan to help you manage it effectively, helping you get back to making the most of life.

Book an appointment now to discuss your pain with one of our specialists.

What is chronic pain?

Chronic pain is pain that lasts for three months or longer, or that continues beyond the expected healing time for an injury or illness. The pain might always be present, or it may periodically come and go.

While acute pain acts as the body's warning system, alerting you to injury or damage, chronic pain typically continues even after the original cause has resolved.

In some cases, the nervous system becomes overly sensitive to pain and continues to send pain signals despite there being no ongoing tissue damage. This process, known as central sensitisation, means that the pain itself becomes a long-term medical condition that may become largely independent of its original cause.

Chronic pain can affect virtually any area of the body, but the most common locations include the:

Back
Neck
Joints
Head
Muscles throughout the body, such as with fibromyalgia

Living with chronic pain can be difficult and frustrating, particularly when the cause of the pain isn't immediately obvious. It's important to know that chronic pain is a recognised medical condition. It’s not "all in your head", nor is it a sign of weakness or exaggeration. Chronic pain can be debilitating and deserves to be taken seriously. A thorough clinical assessment can help identify the underlying causes in your particular case, and can determine the most appropriate treatment options for you.

Common causes of chronic pain

Chronic pain can develop for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it’s linked to an identifiable medical condition or injury, while in other cases the cause can be unclear and difficult to pinpoint.

The most common causes of chronic pain include:

Musculoskeletal conditions that affect the bones, muscles, and joints. This includes osteoarthritis, other forms of arthritis, chronic back pain, and persistent neck pain.
Nerve irritation or damage (neuropathic pain) that can cause burning, shooting, or tingling pain, and other unwanted sensations. This is most often caused by diabetic neuropathy, sciatica, and post-herpetic neuralgia following shingles.
Post-surgical pain. Although most people recover well after surgery, some continue to experience pain long after healing is complete. This is also called persistent post-surgical pain.
Injury. Some injuries, including fractures, soft tissue injuries, and whiplash, can trigger long-lasting pain even after the affected body part has healed.
Long-term health conditions. Certain chronic illnesses are commonly associated with ongoing pain, including fibromyalgia, endometriosis, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and some types of cancer.
Headache disorders. Some headache conditions become chronic, including chronic migraine, chronic tension-type headaches, and cluster headaches.
Pain without an identifiable cause. In some cases, investigations can’t reveal a clear underlying cause of chronic pain. Importantly, this doesn’t mean the pain isn't real. Chronic pain without an obvious cause is recognised by healthcare professionals and can still be successfully managed with the right treatment approach.

Chronic pain symptoms

People can experience chronic pain differently. Two people with the same condition may have very different symptoms and levels of discomfort.

With chronic pain, the pain may be mild to severe. In some, the pain can be continuous, while in others it can come and go. Sometimes the experience of pain can change over time. It can weaken or worsen, or change in other ways, like how the pain is specifically felt.

The most immediate symptoms of chronic pain are usually physical symptoms, including:

A constant aching or throbbing
Sharp, stabbing, or shooting pain
Burning or stinging sensations
Muscle stiffness
Tingling or numbness

However, chronic pain doesn’t just cause direct physical symptoms. It can affect other aspects of your physical and mental health, leading to secondary symptoms and impacting your mental wellbeing.

Secondary symptoms of chronic pain can include:

Fatigue
Poor sleep or insomnia
Reduced mobility
Difficulty concentrating or remembering things (brain fog)

Mental health symptoms of chronic pain may include:

Anxiety
Low mood or depression
Irritability and mood swings
Social withdrawal

A combination of lasting pain, fatigue, poor sleep, and mental health issues like depression can create a reinforcing cycle, with each problem making the others worse. Recognising and addressing both the physical and emotional effects of chronic pain is an important part of effective treatment.

At Ramsay Health Care, our specialists take a holistic approach to chronic pain management, working with you to develop an individual treatment plan that addresses your symptoms, underlying condition, lifestyle, and overall wellbeing.

Chronic pain treatment and pain relief options

Chronic pain is a complex condition that can vary considerably between people, and no treatment approach will work best for everyone. The most effective way to treat and manage lasting pain is for a specialist to devise a personalised treatment plan that will address the underlying causes of your pain. One that suits your lifestyle and needs, and that usually involves combining different treatments.

Depending on your diagnosis and individual requirements, your treatment may include a combination of medication, physiotherapy, pain-relieving injections, psychological therapies, and lifestyle changes.

At Ramsay, our pain specialists can work with you to develop a treatment plan that’s specifically tailored to your goals and circumstances. It may include:

Medication

Medication can play a vital role in managing chronic pain, although it’s rarely the only treatment needed. Different medicines work in different ways, and the most appropriate option will depend on the type and cause of your pain.

Common pain relief medications include:

Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), such as ibuprofen and naproxen, which reduce inflammation and are often used to treat musculoskeletal pain.
Paracetamol, which may help relieve mild to moderate pain.
Neuropathic pain medications, including gabapentin, pregabalin, and amitriptyline, which are commonly prescribed for nerve-related pain relief.
Certain antidepressants, which can help regulate the way the nervous system processes pain while also improving sleep and mood. These benefits are separate and different from their use in treating depression.
Opioid painkillers, which may be considered in specific situations but are generally reserved for short-term use or carefully monitored treatment. Opioids are not usually recommended as a long-term, first-line treatment for chronic pain, as they can be habit-forming.

Medication is often most effective when combined with other treatments, such as physiotherapy, exercise, and other pain management techniques, rather than being used as the only chronic pain treatment.

Interventional pain relief treatments

As well as pain relief medication, targeted pain-relieving procedures can provide significant improvements in symptoms when other treatments haven’t proven effective enough. These minimally invasive procedures are designed to reduce inflammation, interrupt pain signals, or improve function, allowing you to participate more comfortably in rehabilitation and everyday activities.

Depending on the source of your pain, your consultant may recommend:

Epidural steroid injections to reduce inflammation around irritated spinal nerves, helping relieve back and leg pain.
Facet joint injections to relieve pain in the small joints of the spine.
Nerve blocks, which use local anaesthetic to interrupt pain signals travelling along specific nerves.
Sacroiliac joint injections for pain originating from the sacroiliac joints in the lower back and pelvis.
Radiofrequency ablation (RFA), which uses controlled heat to reduce pain signals from targeted nerves and may provide longer-lasting relief than injections alone.
Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS), a non-invasive treatment that uses gentle electrical pulses to help reduce pain signals.

These options will typically only be recommended by a pain specialist where they’re deemed appropriate for your symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment goals.

Physiotherapy and exercise

Remaining active is often one of the most effective ways to manage many types of chronic pain. Although movement may seem difficult at first, the right exercises can help provide pain relief, improve mobility, restore strength and function over time, and help boost your mood.

A physiotherapist can develop an individual exercise programme for you, adapted to your specific case and needs. The goals of this exercise plan often include:

Strengthening the muscles supporting painful joints or your spine
Improving flexibility and range of movement
Improving posture and movement patterns
Improving mood and emotional state (the plan should include forms of exercise that are enjoyable and rewarding)
Increasing activity levels gradually to avoid the "boom and bust" cycle that many people with chronic pain experience with exercise. This is where you overexert yourself on good days, triggering a flare-up of pain and often lasting exhaustion

Depending on your condition, treatment may also include manual therapy, massage, hydrotherapy, and practical advice on workplace ergonomics and everyday movement.

Our Ramsay physiotherapists can work with you to understand your needs and develop an appropriate and effective programme to help relieve pain as part of your holistic treatment plan.

Psychological therapies

Living with chronic pain affects both the body and the mind. Pain can influence your mood, sleep, energy levels, confidence, sociability, and ability to cope. Stress and anxiety can in turn make pain feel more intense. Psychological therapies are designed to help break this cycle and improve your overall quality of life.

Psychological treatment for chronic pain can include:

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). Understanding how thoughts, emotions, and behaviours influence your experience of pain, helping you to develop practical coping strategies for chronic pain management.
Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). Focusing on helping you live a full and meaningful life alongside chronic pain rather than allowing it to dominate your daily activities.
Mindfulness-based approaches. Helping to reduce stress and lessen the emotional impact of persistent pain.

It’s important to emphasise that these therapies won’t suggest that the pain is "all in your head". They’re based on well-established evidence showing the close relationship between the nervous system, emotional wellbeing, and how pain is processed by the brain. They can be an effective part of treating chronic pain holistically.

Lifestyle and self-management

Small, sustainable lifestyle changes that are consistently adopted can make a significant difference to long-term pain management. Alongside medical treatment, healthy daily habits can help reduce pain, improve physical function, and support your overall health and mental wellbeing.

Your pain specialist may recommend:

Regular low-impact exercise such as walking, swimming, or cycling
Adopting good sleep habits, as poor sleep can make pain more difficult to manage and can exacerbate mood problems
Trying stress management techniques, including relaxation exercises, pacing advice, and activity planning
Maintaining a healthy weight to reduce pressure on painful joints and to support overall health
Eating a balanced diet to support your overall health, with some people benefiting from anti-inflammatory dietary approaches
Stopping smoking, as smoking can reduce blood flow to tissues and may worsen some types of chronic pain

Learning how to manage chronic pain effectively can take time and experimentation, and there can be setbacks as well as successes. But combining medical treatments with lifestyle self-management strategies can help many people make lasting improvement in the quality of their lives.

When chronic pain becomes too much

Living with chronic pain can be physically and emotionally exhausting. While many people learn and adopt effective ways to manage their symptoms, there may be times when your pain becomes more difficult to cope with or starts having a greater impact on your daily life.

You should seek further medical advice if:

Your pain is becoming more severe or spreading to other areas of your body
Your current treatment is no longer providing effective relief
Pain is regularly affecting your sleep, work, or everyday activities
You find yourself relying more heavily on pain medication without lasting benefits
You’re experiencing increasing anxiety, low mood, or depression alongside your pain
You feel your current treatment approach isn’t addressing all aspects of your condition or isn’t otherwise proving effective enough

Seeking additional support isn’t a sign of failure or weakness. Help from a pain specialist can be an important step towards finding more effective treatments for chronic pain management and improving your quality of life.

At Ramsay Health Care, our pain management professionals can undertake a comprehensive reassessment of your case to understand how your symptoms have changed and explore further treatment options. Working together, we can develop a personalised care plan to help you manage your pain more effectively and regain confidence in your everyday life.

Book a consultation now to discuss your symptoms with one of our pain management specialists.

Chronic pain treatment cost

The cost of chronic pain treatment with Ramsay will depend on your individual situation, your diagnosis and the specific care you need. After a consultation with one of our pain specialists, we’ll give you a personalised quote for the cost of your treatment. This will be valid for up to 60 days.

We provide a range of payment options, including:

0% Payment Plans: Spread the cost of your chronic pain treatment with fixed, monthly payments over a time period that suits you.
Self-fund treatment: Pay a one-time payment at a pre-agreed price that covers all your treatment, with our all-inclusive Total Care package.
Your own medical insurance: Your private healthcare insurance may cover your chronic pain treatment. You will need written confirmation from your insurance provider before commencing treatment with us.

For a personalised quote or to discuss payment options in more detail, please contact our friendly team.

Chronic pain management at Ramsay Health Care

At Ramsay Health Care, our specialist pain management consultants provide expert, patient-focused care for people living with chronic pain, across our UK hospital network.

Our pain consultants work alongside on-site physiotherapists, psychologists, and specialist nurses, ensuring a joined-up, multidisciplinary approach to your care from your first appointment through to ongoing management.

Your Ramsay experience includes:

Fast access to on-site diagnostics, including MRI, CT, and X-ray imaging, nerve conduction studies, and blood testing.
A comprehensive range of chronic pain treatments, from epidural steroid injections to radiofrequency ablation
Convenient locations across the UK, many with on-site parking. Find your nearest hospital.
Flexible ways to pay, including self-pay, insured pay, and 0% finance options
Dedicated patient support with a friendly specialist team guiding you at every stage of your treatment