People with chronic pain often have difficulty sleeping due to pain. This is commonly a result of an unhelpful sleeping posture or unsuitable bed. A good night’s sleep is very important for restoring your physical and mental health which in turn leads to a better response to the Advance Healthcare Online Pain Management program.

The following resources are useful to read, listen to and engage with early on in your pain management program. Thinking about how this information might apply to your sleep situation and discussing this with your Advance practitioner will greatly assist in your recovery.

1. Sleep diary - one way of problem solving how to improve your sleep is to get a detailed night by night description of what you are doing before, during and after sleep time. Print this sheet, fill it out and discuss with your Advance practitioner

2. Sleeping posture - the key to improving your sleep posture is experimenting with different positions. This sheet explains the options.

3. Mindfulness and sleep - mindfulness is a simple method of relaxing and becoming more “present”. Muscle tension and worrying about sleep are common issues for which mindfulness can help. This sheet outlines some simple mindfulness exercises plus explores Smiling Minds as an app that has a range of exercises specifically designed to help with sleep

4. Inflammation - sometimes poor sleep is due to uncontrolled inflammation. Our research shows that if you have constant pain, morning pain/stiffness and waking in the night inflammation may be a factor. This sheet explains how you can deal with this problem quickly and effectively

If you require this information in a different language, please contact your Advance practitioner.