Pain medicine : the official journal of the American Academy of Pain Medicine
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To better characterize safety profiles associated with the intrathecal (IT) administration of morphine and ziconotide and discuss how they relate to mechanisms of action. ⋯ IT morphine and IT ziconotide are approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for patients who do not respond to less invasive treatments, but the safety profiles of each may make them more or less appropriate for certain patient populations.
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No existing pain treatment is effective for all pain problems, and response to pain treatment is highly variable. Knowledge regarding the patient factors that predict response to different treatments could benefit patients by providing an empirical foundation for patient-treatment matching. This study sought to test the hypothesis that improvements following two treatments thought to operate via similar mechanisms would be predicted by similar baseline pain qualities. ⋯ The findings are consistent with the combined ideas that (1) those who have the most to gain (i.e., those reporting the highest levels of various pain qualities) can expect the best response to effective treatments and (2) different pain qualities may be associated with different types of outcomes. The findings support further research to examine how pain quality measures may be used to improve patient-treatment matching, and therefore, ultimately improve the efficiency, efficacy, and overall benefit-risk of pain treatment.