Pain physician
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Our intent is to report a case of intercostal neuralgia occuring as a complication of splanchnic radiofreqency ablation (RFA), due to a breach in the integrity of the insulating sheath of the RFA needle. A 48-year-old man presented to our pain clinic with upper abdominal pain due to chronic pancreatitis, recalcitrant to medical management. We decided to perform bilateral splanchnic nerve RFA in this patient. ⋯ Convinced of correct needle placement, we examined the RFA needles which had been used for ablation in this patient. One of the needles was discovered to have a fine breach in its insulating sheath, at a distance of approximately 30 mm from the active tip. It is of utmost importance for all interventional pain physicians to perform a thorough pre-use check of the equipment prior to any RFA procedure, with special emphasis on ensuring the integrity of the insulating sheath of the needles which are to be used, in order to prevent injury of non target nerves.
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Postherpetic neuralgia (PHN) is a refractory condition that impairs the patient's quality of life (QoL), it develops secondary to herpes zoster infection. Therefore, it's important to prevent the transition of acute/subacute zoster-related pain to PHN. Despite of numerous studies, the optimal intervention that reduces PHN incidence is still unknown. ⋯ Herpes zoster, zoster-related pain, postherpetic neuralgia, spinal cord stimulation, VAS.
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The current American Society of Regional Anesthesia (ASRA) guidelines recommend discontinuing anti-thrombotic therapy prior to any interventional spine procedures to decrease the incidence of bleeding complications. However, discontinuing anti-thrombotics may pose considerable danger in terms of cerebrovascular and cardiovascular events. Recent evidence suggests that some spinal interventions may still be performed safely with anti-thrombotics on board and some practitioners thus elect to continue certain anti-thrombotics for these procedures. ⋯ Interventional pain management, thrombotic complications, hemostasis, anti-coagulation, bleeding complications.