Neuropathic Pain

Update on treatment planning, risk management, and ongoing monitoring for efficacy, safety, and adherence in patients treated with opioids for chronic, noncancer pain.

Lack of correlation reinforces the need to individualize therapy based on clinical effectiveness for that patient in order to optimize treatment outcomes.

Fibromyalgia patients who don't respond to Lyrica (pregabalin) may see their pain scores significantly improve after adding Savella (milnacipran) to their treatment regimens.

Transforaminal epidural steroid injections (TFEI) have become a more common approach to relieving chronic lumbar radicular pain, but until now, no published clinical reports had directly compared morphine with tramadol for that indication.

Pain is a common symptom in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS), with some studies showing that clinically significant pain associated with their disease is experienced by more than half of patients with MS.

Results of a recent clinical trial by researchers at the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine in the Affiliated Tenth People's Hospital of Tongji University, in Shanghai, China, have deemed locally injected methylcobalamin more effective than its orally administered counterpart as a treatment for subacute herpetic neuralgia.

The agency rejected a request from the painkiller's manufacturer to outlaw generic versions lacking tamper-resistant features just weeks after deciding the opposite way for generic versions of OxyContin.

Treating postherpetic neuralgia patients with the oral opioid agonist tramadol may significantly reduce moderate to severe nerve pain.

With what we now know about opioid misuse and abuse, we need to take the necessary steps to ensure that only abuse-resistant/deterrent medications are used for our patients taking ER/LA opioid medications.

Achieving safe, effective pain control for inpatients can challenge even experienced clinicians. Components of successful pain control include avoiding pain crises while still steering clear of respiratory depression, being confident with equianalgesic calculations, and transitioning to the outpatient setting.

Though the total National Institutes of Health (NIH) budget has stayed flat over the past several years, chronic pain research has enjoyed an expanded slice of the federal funding pie, as dollars committed to that portion of science grew from $279 million in 2008 to $396 million in 2012.

Results from a small study indicate patients with difficult-to-treat diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN) may benefit from therapy with tanezumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody against nerve growth factor.

Analysis of claims data finds patients often receive starting doses of Butrans that do not follow published recommendations, with more than one-third of patients receiving initial doses that are too low.

Successful CRPS management should be viewed as a continuum that requires a flexible treatment approach that incorporates pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic components.

Pain is a common side effect of cancer that can be caused by the disease itself, treatment, and other factors. Greater awareness of the causes and types of cancer pain, knowledge of available treatments, and willingness to consult pain specialists are the keys to providing effective cancer pain management.

New implantable technologies such as spinal cord stimulation and peripheral nerve stimulation have shown great potential to improve the management of patients with chronic pain.

The authors of three award-winning posters shared results and insights at the 2013 AAPM Annual Meeting.

Promising advances in research hint at the day when truly tailored pain management will be possible, allowing us to move past our current model of treatment.

Severe neuropathic pain due to diabetic peripheral neuropathy is associated with negative health impact and increased healthcare utilization, underscoring the need for the development of safe and effective treatments.

Researchers successfully treated a patient with refractory complex regional pain syndrome by inducing a coma with ketamine and dexmedetomidine.

Study results show that intrathecal ziconotide provides significant pain relief for patients with refractory painful myelopathies and neuropathies.

MRI data shows that multiple sclerosis patients with central neuropathic pain often have lesions focused in the center of the mid-thoracic spinal cord.

With most medical schools devoting only a few curriculum hours to pain management training, many physicians begin their medical career underprepared to meet the needs of patients suffering with chronic pain. Here, Barry Cole, MD, identifies several key concepts that would help improve pain care in the US if only more physicians would learn about them sooner.