Pain practice : the official journal of World Institute of Pain
-
There are few studies estimating the prevalence of chronic pain in countries from the Middle East. We translated the Structured Telephone Interviews Questionnaire on Chronic Pain from English into Arabic and assessed its reliability and linguistic validity before using it in a telephone survey in Libya to gather preliminary prevalence data for chronic pain. Intraclass correlations for scaled items were high, and there were no differences in answers to nominal items between the first and second completions of the questionnaire. ⋯ Some participants complained that the questionnaire was too long with a mean ± SD call duration of 20 ± 5.4 minutes. We conclude that the Arabic Structured Telephone Interviews Questionnaire on Chronic Pain was reliable and linguistically valid and could be used in a large-scale telephone survey on the Libyan population. Our preliminary estimate of prevalence should be considered with caution because of the small sample size.
-
Assess the efficacy of an outpatient-based interdisciplinary pain rehabilitation program for patients with active workers compensation claims. ⋯ Our results support the efficacy of an outpatient-based 4-week interdisciplinary pain rehabilitation program in decreasing emotional distress, reducing pain intensity, and improving return-to-work status in the majority of completers in this challenging population. Patients reporting increased pain at discharge or those discharged early may have been due to operant factors.
-
Review Case Reports
Intentional intrathecal opioid detoxification in 3 patients: characterization of the intrathecal opioid withdrawal syndrome.
Intrathecal (IT) drug delivery systems for patients with chronic non-malignant pain are intended to improve pain and quality of life and reduce side effects of systemic use. A subset of patients may have escalating pain, functional decline, and/or intolerable side effects even as IT opioid doses are increased. Discontinuation of IT medications may represent a viable treatment option but strategies to accomplish this are needed. ⋯ This preliminary work demonstrates the safety of abrupt IT opioid cessation utilizing standardized inpatient withdrawal protocols. To our knowledge, these are among the first reported cases of intentional, controlled IT opioid cessation without initiation of an opioid bridge: self-reported pain scores, functional capacity, and quality of life improved. The IT opioid withdrawal syndrome is characterized based upon our observations and a review of the literature.
-
We report a retrospective audit of transcutaneous pulsed radiofrequency treatment therapy (TCPRFT) for shoulder pain over a 4-year period. ⋯ These results suggest TCPRFT may provide clinically useful pain relief and be another treatment modality for shoulder pain. Our findings justifies further research, and we are proceeding with a double-blind placebo randomized controlled studies to determine the efficacy of TCPRFT in chronic shoulder pain.