Der Schmerz
-
National and international surveys have shown that the quality of pain therapy in hospitals shows deficits, especially in the nonoperative disciplines. ⋯ In addition to the perioperative modules of QUIPS, QUIKS (quality improvement in conservative pain management), an instrument for quality assurance of pain treatment in patients in nonoperative disciplines, is now available.
-
Neuropathic pain consistently presents a significant therapeutic challenge. Topically applied analgesics have the advantage of showing low systemic side effects, but data on long-term effectiveness are lacking. Consequently, interviews were carried out with all patients being treated with topical analgesics in hospital. ⋯ Despite the long duration of the disease, the most used off-label topical drugs L and B demonstrated a high primary response rate (in contrast to C), with most benefiting from long-term treatment.
-
This article describes the case of a female patient with symptoms of complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) of the right wrist and forearm. Ergotherapy of the affected hand (unilateral desensitization) showed little success and became impossible with increasing environmental temperature due to excessive pain. A physiological feedback via simultaneous treatment of the unaffected healthy arm (bilateral treatment approach) ultimately led to a clear decline of all CRPS symptoms.