title: Chronic Orofacial Pain and Behavioral Medicine.
abstract: Patients with chronic orofacial pain disorders have significant psychological distress that plays an important role in modulating and maintaining their pain. For many patients, doing procedures or giving them medications does not relieve their pain. This article discusses the role of cognitive behavioral therapy and other related types of therapy, including mindfulness practices in modulating their pain disorders and helping patients to understand and participate in exercises and practices that will downregulate their pain and add to their toolbox of things they can do to gain relief.
authors.affiliation: Graduate Orofacial Pain Program, UCLA School of Dentistry, Los Angeles, CA, USA. Electronic address: rmerrill@ucla.edu.
authors.forename: Robert L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Merrill
authors.affiliation: Graduate Orofacial Pain Program, UCLA School of Dentistry, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Donald
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Goodman
mesh_terms: D001521:Behavior Therapy; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*; D005157:Facial Pain / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*; D059408:Pain Management / Q000379:methods*; D010147:Pain Measurement; D011581:Psychological Tests
keywords: Chronic pain; Cognitive-behavioral therapy; Mindfulness; Somatic arousal; Somatic quieting