In the first article, experts in pain medicine at ASA developed a broad-based set of evidence based guidelines for all physicians treating patients with pain, which address a wide range of therapies applied to the treatment of pain and incorporate key advancements in the field of pain medicine over the past decade, according to the release. Therapies addressed in the guidelines include medical management, acupuncture, physical therapy, nerve blocks, ablative procedures, epidural injections, intradiscal procedures and advanced neuromodulation techniques.
The second article evaluated several predisposing factors suggested to increase the risk for postoperative pain including age, pre-operative pain, anxiety, depression, sensory function and nerve injury, according to the release. Researchers investigated 19 potential predisposing factors for the development of persistent pain following surgery in 463 adult male patients scheduled to undergo primary groin hernia repair. Preoperatively, patients were evaluated using a standardized questionnaire for their current pain, anxiety and depressing screening, pain coping strategies and pain related impairment. Pain was then assessed during the first week after surgery and at 30 days after surgery.
Researchers identified four factors as independently predictive for the development of pain-related impairment of daily activities: preoperative AAS-score, preoperative pain-response to a heat stimulus in the area of surgery, 30-day pain intensity and nerve damage or impairment of sensory function at 6 months. Laparoscopic surgery resulted in less nerve damage than open surgery, according to the report.
Read the ASA’s release on pain management research.
