Paint Your Pain - Art Exhibit Reception at Overlook Hospital

• From constant, dagger-like sharpness, to searing heat, to confining isolation, the many perceptions of pain, both physical, emotional and otherwise, by those who experience it are rendered in intimate detail in the works of art that will be part of a new exhibit opening at the Pain Management Center at Overlook Hospital this month.

A reception on Wednesday, March 9, 2011, will open “Paint Your Pain,” an arts therapy initiative offered by the Pain Management Center to allow individuals an opportunity to express how pain affects their lives. The program was created as a long-term teaching display by having participants submit a work of art that tells others about their pain experience.

“Everyone experiences pain at one point or another and each individual is the best judge of his or her own pain,” said Rosemary Smith, RN, clinical coordinator. “The Pain Management Center team at Overlook Hospital believes that through art, people can increase awareness of self and others, cope with symptoms, stress and traumatic experiences.”

The approximately 25 piece-exhibits includes artwork in a variety of mediums, created by those who experience chronic pain, including patients at the center, as well as family and friends who have expressed their own impressions of sharing the pain of loved ones.

The Pain Management Center, a part of the Atlantic Neuroscience Institute, is a multidisciplinary outpatient facility that strives to minimize pain in a minimally invasive manner. Housed in the state-of-the-art Medical Arts Building II, the Pain Management Center is staffed by nationally-recognized pain management experts, who diagnose and treat a wide variety of conditions, from post operative pain, to back and neck pain, to cancer pain. Treatments at the center include pain management, interventional procedures, nutrition, neurology, podiatry, behavioral health and integrative medicine such as massage and acupuncture.

The event takes place from 6:00 - 7:00 p.m.   is located at 99 Beauvoir Ave, Summit.

For more information, visit http://www.atlantichealth.org or call 1-800-247-9580.