Dr. Joe Tatta: Why Can't We Just Turn Pain Off?

Dr. Melissa Cady discusses Dr. Joe Tatta's journey as a physical therapist while acquiring additional training as a nutritionist and pain educator. They also discuss why it can be so difficult to help those challenged by pain.

Timeline:

01:00 Joe’s background and training

04:00 Why the nutrition training

06:15 What he has learned about the online pain experiment

08:25 We do not have enough clinicians to help people with pain

09:10 Education is not alone to create behavior change

10:55 How to help patients with behavior change

15:00 His experience with patients who have tried “everything”

16:00 Admitting that a clinician may not be able to change a patient’s pain

17:00 Be curious

18:00 Controlling, eliminating, or avoiding pain

20:40 Live Life to help pain (vs. holding off life to eliminate pain first)

23:00 Creative hopelessness activity

25:15 You can’t just turn off anger or other emotions like a switch; similar to pain

26:20 Negative effects of not feeling pain

28:45 Multidisciplinary pain clinics

31:00 More efficient with one clinician due to better bond

32:00 Radical Relief book with 36 short chapters

34:00 How Dr. Cady deals with her own pain

36:30 STOP activity: Stop → Take a breath → Observe → Proceed

38:00 Be intentional and aware

39:00 Be comfortable with being uncomfortable

40:00 Can you really get rid of pain?

You can learn more about Joe Tatta and his work at: https://www.integrativepainscienceinstitute.com/

You can also find his most recent book Radical Relief, which was discussed during the interview, here:

https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Relief-Mindfulness-Acceptance-Commitment/dp/1942798229