Answer: You may not be able to. Physicians are not trained in pain management during their medical training. Rudimentary understanding as to analgesia is another issue. Most MD's and DO's confuse the two. A pain diary is your best chance of documenting your pain and pain patterns. Also, how it affects your activities of daily living.

If you really like your doctor and want to stay with him or her, ask if they have a partner that would help treat your pain. In other words, a referral to the right pain practitioner. In the early going, I would suggest that you stick with the medical model, but alternative therapies do work in certain patients. Unfortunately many alternative providers spend most of their time convincing you there's something wrong with you and put their particular spin on what you have and how to fix you. Patients with fibromyalgia really don't need this. They need somebody to have a definitive plan that's worked for other patients with the same problem. Flowery explanations and useless, unsubstantiated "breakthroughs" will not keep you functional. Quality alternative providers do exist, it's just that they are not great in number.

It's my goal to put future web page links to practitioners that I think reflect high ethics and a quality product accountable to outcome.