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Concept
Mindfulness-based pain management
Summary
Mindfulness-based pain management (MBPM) is a mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) providing specific applications for people living with chronic pain and illness. Adapting the core concepts and practices of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), MBPM includes a distinctive emphasis on the practice of 'loving-kindness', and has been seen as sensitive to concerns about removing mindfulness teaching from its original ethical framework. It was developed by Vidyamala Burch and is delivered through the programs of Breathworks. It has been subject to a range of clinical studies demonstrating its effectiveness.
Vidyamala Burch and Breathworks
MBPM was developed by Vidyamala Burch, growing out of her experience of chronic pain, her practice of Buddhist meditation, and her work with medical experts in pain management. Having suffered several accidents in her early life which, alongside a congenital spine condition, left her with severe long-term pain and partial paraplegia, Burch turned to meditation initially as a way to escape her bodily experience, after having been introduced to visualization practice during a long hospital stay in her mid-20s. Eventually, after encountering the Triratna Buddhist Community, she became a practicing Buddhist, and moved from New Zealand to the UK to live full-time in a residential Buddhist community. In the late-1990s she suffered a further collapse in her health, confining her to home for long periods and requiring her to start using a wheelchair, which led her to re-evaluate her meditation practice. Burch realized that "my approach was out of balance: Too much striving and not enough acceptance." She read widely about pain management and the emerging secular mindfulness movement, and eventually began teaching a course in meditation for people with chronic pain and illness in Manchester. In 2004, she co-founded the organization Breathworks, which delivers MBPM programs.
Philosophically, the origins of MBPM lie in the Buddha's teachings about suffering, mindfulness, and loving-kindness.
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