Pain physician
-
There have been many meta-analyses and systematic reviews that have discussed the differences between unilateral and bilateral balloon kyphoplasty. However, their conclusions regarding the efficacy and safety of bilateral balloon kyphoplasty in the treatment of osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures (OVCFs) are discordant. ⋯ Osteoporotic vertebral compression fracture, kyphoplasty, unilateral, bilateral, unipedicular, bipedicular, systematic review.
-
Sacroiliac (SI) joint fusion represents a unique area of orthopedic surgery with procedural literature dating to the early 1920s, showing limited innovation in either technique or hardware over the last 90 years. Recent improvements in the diagnosis and treatment of SI joint dysfunction warrant comparisons to older surgical techniques. ⋯ Meta-analysis, systematic review, sacroiliac joint, sacroiliac joint fusion.
-
Recently posterior cervical foraminotomy (PCF) performed using a minimally-invasive surgery (MIS) approach for cervical radiculopathy due to lateral disc herniation or osseous foraminal stenosis has gained popularity. As 2 dominating MIS techniques, whether FE-PCF or MI-PCF provides superior clinical outcomes remains controversial. ⋯ Cervical radiculopathy, full-endoscopic, microendoscopic, posterior cervical foraminotomy, clinical outcome, complication, reoperation, meta-analysis.
-
Assessment of pain is important in daily clinical practice and as an endpoint in clinical studies. Because pain perception is highly subjective, pain measurement is complex. Self-rating pain scales are currently of great importance but have limitations. They depend on many more factors than pain, which could lead to an incorrect assessment of therapies or clinical studies. Therefore, there is need for valid, reliable, safe, and low-cost methods to determine and quantify patients' pain more objectively. ⋯ Several devices and techniques compared pain intensity experienced by patients with an external pain stimulus that potentially could be used as a new objective pain measurement tool. Given the results of our review, electrical stimulators that have been tested extensively with high validity, reliability, and feasibility would be recommended for use for clinical and research purposes. Moreover, normalization of pain intensity scores for current perception is important. Pain intensity normalization leads to higher correlations with established pain scales and possibly to increased inter-patient reliability.Registration number: Registered in the PROSPERO database (PROSPERO 2016:CRD42016041974)KEY WORDS: Systematic review, objective pain measurement, pain scales; devices, techniques, validity, reliability, safety, feasibility.
-
First isolated as cyanocobalamin in 1948, vitamin B12 has been explored for pain treatment almost since its discovery. With the advent of the opioid epidemic, safer treatments for pain are needed. ⋯ Vitamin B12, cyanocobalamin, methylcobalamin, hydroxycobalamin, pain, chronic pain, neuropathy, low back pain.