Pain Management Education and Training During Psychiatry Residency: A Report on National Progress

Chronic pain is a major public health issue in the United States, affecting over 100 million people [1] and costing in the range of $560 to $635 billion annually [2]. There is relatively little pain management education and training in medical school curricula, and such knowledge is rarely tested in proficiency exams [3, 4]. Despite the high comorbidity of chronic pain and psychiatric illness, psychiatry residents receive even less pain management training [4–6]. Suggestions to include pain management in medical school or psychiatry residency curricula have, in the past, been met with resistance, even though Pain Medicine is a subspecialty of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology [4, 6]. Nonetheless, psychiatrists receive some training relevant to pain management that makes them potentially more suited to managing chronic pain [6, 7]. Psychiatrists are well versed in the psychotropic medications and psychotherapeutic interventions that are effective in the treatment of pain and in the treatment of common psychiatric comorbidities, including substance use disorders, that negatively impact the effectiveness of pain treatment [8–10].