Visceral pain involves your visceral organs — the ones in your chest, abdomen and pelvis — and the tissue that covers them. If something goes awry in your heart, lungs, bladder, reproductive organs or digestive system organs, your body will alert you by causing you to feel pain.
Advertisement
Cleveland Clinic is a non-profit academic medical center. Advertising on our site helps support our mission. We do not endorse non-Cleveland Clinic products or services. Policy
But not all pain feels the same. The pain you feel during a finger prick for a blood draw is different from the visceral pain you experience from a bladder infection, for example.
Visceral pain can feel both deep down and hard to pinpoint, even when there’s no denying the unpleasant feeling that’s there.
What does visceral pain feel like?Describing any pain is tricky because everyone experiences it differently. Everyone has their own perception of when pain feels “mild,” “moderate,” or “severe.”
Generally, visceral pain feels like it’s deep inside your torso and spread out. Visceral pain is typically more dull than sharp, more aching than stabbing. It’s more vague (and harder to describe) than specific. But this isn’t a hard and fast rule.
Some of the words people use to describe their visceral pain include:
Deep.Spread out (diffuse).Crampy.Achy.Squeezing.Gnawing.Dull.Pressure.Persistent.When it comes to the pain threshold, the experience of visceral pain isn’t always equal to the injury. For example, minor tissue damage may feel excruciating while a major injury may not feel as painful. It depends.
Where is visceral pain felt?One reason healthcare providers often describe visceral pain as vague is because, although you usually feel it in the trunk of your body, it’s hard to pinpoint the exact spot where the pain is coming from. Instead, your brain may only recognize the general problem area, like your chest or abdomen.
Advertisement
Sometimes, your brain can’t map the pain onto the part of your body where an organ or tissue is damaged or under stress. Pain that’s located in one place but perceived in a different place is called referred pain.
For example, stomach ulcers usually cause a gnawing visceral pain in your abdomen, but some people feel the pain in their chest instead.
When it comes to visceral pain, the sensations may not offer up enough specifics to clue you in on what’s wrong. You may he to “trust your gut” and just know that something (in general) is off — and see a healthcare provider.
What’s the difference between visceral pain and somatic pain?The nerves in your skin, muscles, joints, bones and subcutaneous tissue (the tissue layer beneath your skin) cause somatic pain. There are more concentrated nerves in this tissue. This means that the pain usually feels sharp and local instead of dull and spread out (as with visceral pain).
Imagine the difference between a stomachache and a paper cut (somatic pain). While a stomachache usually feels like lingering, dull discomfort throughout your belly, a papercut feels like sharpness at the exact spot where the paper tore the skin. Even if you couldn’t see the blood or the cut, your brain would still know where the tissue was damaged.
What symptoms happen alongside visceral pain?Signs and symptoms that typically accompany visceral pain are what healthcare providers call “nonspecific.” They’re changes in your body that indicate an issue but aren’t especially helpful when it comes to identifying the specific condition causing your pain. Symptoms that sometimes accompany visceral pain include:
Nausea & vomiting.Pale skin (pallor).Sweating.Changes in your heart rate, body temperature or blood pressure.Many people with long-term (chronic) visceral pain also he a mental health condition, like anxiety or depression. This doesn’t mean that these conditions cause visceral pain or that visceral pain causes mental health conditions. Researchers continue to study the relationship.
In the meantime, we know that, at least sometimes, there’s a connection. For example, people with anxiety often describe the unpleasant experience of feeling their stomach churn. People with depression may describe sensations they’re carrying deep inside their bodies as “anguish,” an emotion that captures the intersection between physical and psychological pain.
What is an example of visceral pain?Examples of visceral pain include:
The painful menstrual cramps you may he during your periods.Pain in your abdomen, pelvis, sides or low back when you he a urinary tract infection (UTI).The pain or feeling of fullness that happens with Crohn’s disease.Advertisement
In all cases, your brain perceives changes in your body’s visceral organs — whether from infection, inflammation or even a normal monthly bodily process — as something unpleasant happening deep inside you.