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Researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health write that opportunities to advance the use of non-medication alternative therapies for lower back pain are being stymied by unhelpful public and private insurance treatment. In their investigation, the Bloomberg School researchers...
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Practitioners have been outspoken in describing how they feel a lack of confidence in their own abilities to use opioids, in who to use them, and how to use them. If you couple that with their lack of knowledge about the alternatives to opioids, you really have a situation that is bound to fail...
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Researchers from the University of Sydney report encouraging results from the introduction of video games as therapy for chronic lower back pain. The authors write that their findings provide additional support for the use of video games as a treatment modality for back pain, which have previously...
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Conclusions from a double-blind randomized clinical trial suggest that low-dose amitriptyline may be beneficial in the treatment of chronic low back pain. The study found that, although it did not significantly improve patients’ pain levels, use of the antidepressant did reduce disability, and...
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Researchers from the Department of Veterans Affairs in conjunction with an international team have identified 3 novel genetic variants that are associated with increased risk for chronic back pain. The discovery may help to inform a better understanding of the biology of back pain, as well as...
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An analysis conducted by researchers at University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health concludes that rising death rates from drug overdoses in the US long precede the now notorious “opioid crisis,” and that a near perfect exponential growth curve in these rates can be tracked back to the...
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A small study conducted by researchers from the Center for Drug Use and HIV/HCV (CDUHR) at New York University concludes that managers and staff of publicly patronized business establishments can be effective first responders to incidents of opioid overdose, if they are properly trained. A prior...
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When we talk about complex pain and patients with advanced illness, there are some basics that people need to know, which is how to treat the patients with opioids and other coanalgesic medications, but the key point is that it’s a team affair, and I would ask primary care physicians not to do it...
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Researchers from Northwestern University report that they have identified psychological and physiological characteristics that are associated with greater responsiveness to placebo effect in the modulation of pain. Study author A. Vania Apkarian, PhD, professor of physiology at Northwestern’s...
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A Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) released last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) offers updated data on the estimated prevalence of chronic pain in America. The report summarizes conclusions from a 2016 survey conducted in fulfillment of a National Pain...