CYCLE OF PAIN OF CRPS OR MECHANISM OF RSD
This diagram shows how the cycle of pain works with this CRPS. Think of a computer that gets frozen and you have to re-boot it, or “force-quit” an application to get it to work correctly again. That is what is going on with this disease.
Even after the normal healing time has passed, the brain does not know that the injury is healed because it is still receiving pain signals. It is “stuck” in this never-ending cycle where the brain thinks the body is still in pain, the pain from the original injury, even though it is healed. It is sort of like a broken record that skips, playing that same sequence over and over again. And because the brain can be a powerful ally OR a weapon, it actually causes adverse changes to occur in the body.
If you really want to get into the physiology behind this disease look into the Fight or Flight response.
You can check out www.rsdrx.com also where Dr Hooshang Hooshmand was talking about this fight or flight, the use of ice, and so many other aspects of this disease years before pretty much everyone else in the field. He has passed on now but for those of us who were lucky enough to hear him speak about this disease he was a brilliant man who was very far ahead of his time and if he had only had a few million dollars to spend on research who knows where we would be right now.