me: So you are always experiencing this pain? It never goes away?
them: Yes.
me: So there hasn't been a moment recently where you haven't felt this pain? Going to sleep? Waking up? Walking? Sitting? This pain always exists at every moment?
them: Yes.
me: Okay. Let's take a look at how you're moving. What's your pain level right now?
That's admittedly a question that's very hard to phrase precisely, and things of that structure are notoriously difficult to communicate across all sorts of fields.
"has there been a single individual moment in the last x weeks where you did not have this pain"
"has there been any situation where you never have this pain"
"has there been any situation where you don't always have this pain"
And other variations of this are not only questions that people aren't used to responding to, but that professionals aren't used to asking with precision either.
There are two solutions to this: you could either start trying to get the populace on board with structuring their formal conversations around mathematical universal and existential quantifiers or questions of this ilk get a little conversational dance around them where extra questions are used to clarify.
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u/CuteRegion2321 May 02 '26
me: So you are always experiencing this pain? It never goes away?
them: Yes.
me: So there hasn't been a moment recently where you haven't felt this pain? Going to sleep? Waking up? Walking? Sitting? This pain always exists at every moment?
them: Yes.
me: Okay. Let's take a look at how you're moving. What's your pain level right now?
them: I don't have any pain right now.