Pain Management…how to handle it

The goal of pain management is to improve function, enabling individuals to work, attend school and to participate in life’s daily activities that many of us take for granted. Patients and their physicians have a number of options for the treatment of pain; some treat the perception of pain at the brain level with opiates and narcotics and others treat the source by reducing inflammation and resetting nerve activity. Opiates and narcotics provide only short term relief with many side effects including addiction and gastro intestinal issues. Corticosteroid injections are used to treat the source of pain but are limited in their scope and dosage due to a host of side effects including bone and tissue degeneration, mood changes, weight gain and suppression of natural healing agents. The Doctors at AZ Pain Centers set out to find a new procedure that was not only effective, but safe, giving patients an option or alternative to typical pain management techniques. Recently their medical team developed a procedure that safely treats the “source” of pain without the typical side effects of corticosteroids or oral non-steroidal anti-inflammatories. This amazing shift in medical pain management strategy is helping thousands of Arizonans return to life they deserve.
Until now the most common pain interventional treatments have utilized Corticosteroid medications which were designed to reduce swelling and reset nerve activity thus eliminating pain; but they are limited in their effectiveness and scope. Corticosteroids (steroids), because of their many side effects, are limited in the amount of medication that can be administered to the patient during each treatment. The Corticosteroid dosage is extremely small to avoid potentially damaging tissue and bone density, thus making it difficult to treat the entire source of pain. Corticosteroids are also known to work against our body’s own healing mechanisms by causing adrenal suppression of cortisol which we believe limits their ability to produce longer relief. Our procedure is not limited and was designed to work synergistically with the body’s natural production of Cortisol. This breakthrough in interventional pain medicine allows our Doctors to treat the spinal nerves both bilaterally and on multiple levels, including acupuncture points, which provides more effective relief. Our Medical team is dedicated to helping our patients to which they serve. We believe that our experience, dedication and constant pursuit for more effective pain treatments that work with our body’s own healing agents gives us a distinct advantage over typical treatment protocols. Come experience the difference.