Addiction and chronic pain: how to prevent its therapeutic stigmatization?

Chronic pain and addiction disorders are both complex health problems which take epidemic
dimension in the last decade in occidental countries. It has conditioned a profound debate on
the therapeutic use of potentially addictive analgesic substances as opioids and cannabinoids
are. An undesirable consequence of the clinical indeterminacy related with these emergent
problems is the stigmatization of persons suffering chronic pain, which are beginning to be the
focus of social prejudices the addiction patients are suffering.
The utility of the concept “allostasis” to avoid the stigma related to the unknowledge of these
complex health problems is described. It is proposed that neuropsychiatry understood under
an anthropological perspective can be helpful in the theoretical integration for the management
and treatment of chronic pain and addiction as closely related problems.