A reader of my blog suggested that I read "The Pain Cure" by Dharma Singh Khalsa, M.D. and Cameron Stauth. The copyright is from 1999, so it's not the newest book out there, but I decided to check it out. In one of my posts from a long time ago, I mentioned that I bet migraines are more painful than childbirth (or something along those lines). I've never had a kid but I've had plenty of migraines. Now I'd like to take a moment to say, I told you so.
Chapter 2 has a "Severity of Pain" chart that lists various ailments by numbers 1, being least painful, through 10, most painful:
1 - Moderate sunburn
2- Sprain
3- Mild arthritis, or moderate tension headache
4- Phantom limb pain, or broken bone
5- Back pain
6- Severe arthritis, or fibromyalgia
7- Invasive tumor pain
8- Giving birth
9- Infant colic
And drumroll please...10 - the most painful ailments - Migraine headache, or severe burn.
So you might be wondering, as I was, how can they tell that infant colic is more painful than those other things when infants can't even talk? I'm not a doctor, but I'm guessing someone did a study and tested brain waves to get these results. The source of this information or details involved are not listed on the chart or in that chapter, but I'm not finished with the book so maybe it discusses it more in depth later on.
But I've experienced 5 of these ailments, and I think this pain scale is pretty accurate.
