Current pain and headache reports
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Patients and physicians are frequently unaware that pain coming from the muscles of the head and neck is probably the cause of the most frequent forms of migraine. Identifying the extracranial origins of the patient's headache by physical examination should reassure patient and examiner that the headache is benign and treatable. The results of the examination should lead to physical treatment, reducing headache frequency and severity. This paper describes techniques of the physical examination to identify the extracranial causes of migraine headache.
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Low back pain is one of the complaints most commonly seen in the clinical setting. Correctly or incorrectly, these patients are often given the diagnosis of fibromyalgia, myofascial pain syndrome, disk herniation, or some other label. ⋯ Therefore, in order to fully evaluate and treat a patient with low back pain, it is necessary to consider and address these soft tissue conditions. This paper reviews soft tissue causes of low back pain and discusses how they are most appropriately diagnosed and managed.
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Cervical whiplash injuries are common and yet poorly understood. Several of these cases become chronic for unknown reasons and defy most forms of musculoskeletal therapy. Botulinum toxin has shown promise in selected cases in which soft tissue injury predominates. In conjunction with a good biomechanical assessment and appropriate physical rehabilitation techniques, this new approach to treatment may offer a way of treating the central and peripheral dysfunction that characterizes this condition.
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Fibromyalgia is a common disorder of diffuse musculoskeletal pain. Several rheumatic diseases can mimic fibromyalgia, and a clinician would not want to miss these diagnoses because of their potential long-term sequelae, such as progressive joint damage or life- or organ-threatening disease if they remain untreated. This paper discusses the typical clinical presentations of selected rheumatic diseases (systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, polymyalgia rheumatica, and osteoarthritis) then highlights the key features in history, laboratory testing, and radiographic imaging that aid the clinician in differentiating between fibromyalgia and these rheumatic diseases.
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Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs are the mainstay of migraine treatment for children and adolescents by most primary care physicians. Not all patients respond to these readily available agents. Triptans have been studied in children and adolescents, and there is reasonable evidence to support the use of these agents in these populations. ⋯ Agents such as antidepressants, anticonvulsants, and antihypertensives are commonly used in clinical practice. Safety issues are fairly well understood because of historical use and use for other conditions. Efficacy and optimal dosing have yet to be established for the treatment of migraine in children and adolescents in double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trials.