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Pain Management
When you get injured or have surgery, you expect to hurt for a
while, but you know that in time, you'll heal and the pain will
leave. If you have a medical condition — from arthritis to heart
disease to shingles — you recognize discomfort as a symptom and
trust that treatment will help. While you wait for your body to
mend, pain medication provides relief.
Chronic pain is different. Sometimes, it's an after effect of an
injury that appears to have healed. Sometimes, it's a lingering
symptom of a past illness. Usually the nervous system, including
the brain, where the pain is being processed, has changed. Over
time, physical pain takes an emotional toll, making your body hurt
even more. Anxiety magnifies unpleasant sensations, and sleep
problems leave you feeling weak and helpless.
 When you have chronic
pain, it can dominate your thinking, sometimes in ways that aren't obvious.
To become informed about your condition, for instance, you may spend a lot
of time monitoring pain-related publications and Internet newsgroups. Of
course it's important to understand what's happening to your body and
perhaps connect with people who have similar problems. But constantly
reading and talking about pain keeps you focused on what's wrong when you
could be finding ways to build on everything that's still right.
Persistence, poor response to treatment, unknown cause, sleep disruption and
emotional fallout — these are the hallmarks of chronic pain. And the longer
you've had it, the less likely it will be to disappear, whatever you do. But
chronic pain doesn't have to rule your life.
Initial Evaluation for Pain Management
Since most individuals with chronic back pain conditions have already
received some medical tests or treatment, it is requested that you bring
the following to your appointment:
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Current x-ray films or discs and reports
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MRI films or discs and reports
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CT or myelogram films or discs and reports
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EMG/nerve conduction reports
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List of current medications and medication bottles
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Operative reports or procedure reports
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Doctor’s history and progress reports
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