What can Pain Clinic do for you?

        The outpatient service of the hospital is quite diversified. Have you ever heard of "Pain Department"? What diseases does the treatment include? This issue of "Health Column" unveils the mystery of "Pain Department".

                When many people enter the "pain department" clinic, the first question is often: "I have physical pain, but I don't know what department to hang, so I have to hang the pain department. Is that right?"

        In fact, there is no mistake, because pain is often a warning signal generated by certain diseases or injuries that stimulate nerves. Although it is helpful for doctors to find the disease site as early as possible, long lasting or intense pain may not only cause discomfort to the patient and affect the quality of life, but also may cause psychological and mental stress to the patient, resulting in depression, increased drug use, and even affect the work performance. How to help patients relieve pain and discomfort without affecting relevant medical treatment is the work of the pain clinic.

        Common pain problems

        Pain is a subjective feeling. Everyone's description and tolerance of pain are different, and it is not easy to measure objectively. Generally, pain can be divided into acute and chronic pain. The former is usually caused by body tissue trauma, such as common trauma, surgery, fasciitis and other musculoskeletal nerve injuries. Because the cause is clear, the symptoms can disappear after appropriate treatment for several weeks at most.

        Chronic pain is usually a problem for patients. When the pain lasts for more than a few months, if not treated, it is often easy to indirectly cause depression, insomnia, anxiety and other psychological disorders, or other physical disability conditions, affecting the quality of life, including long-term low back pain, sciatica, trigeminal neuralgia, post herpetic neuralgia, fibromyalgia, etc. Some patients even have chronic pain after surgery. However, If early diagnosis and active treatment can be made, substantial improvement can usually be achieved.

        In addition to general pain, cancer or cancer treatment process can also damage body tissues, affect bones, nerves, etc., and then cause acute and chronic pain. If necessary, other specialties can also be referred to the pain clinic for treatment.

        Current pain treatment

        Traditional pain treatment is mainly based on oral drugs. For example, when treating acute pain, non steroid analgesics are often used; Morphine like analgesics can be used to treat pain of moderate intensity or above; As for neuropathic pain, antiepileptic drugs are often used, including antidepressants such as serotonin and positive adrenal recovery inhibitors, to help patients alleviate pain and discomfort through compound drugs.

        In recent years, thanks to the progress of neuroscience and imaging medicine, pain medicine has also developed a variety of treatment methods, including: muscle pain point injection, intra-articular and tendon injection, hyperplasia therapy, physical therapy, etc. In addition, ultrasound guided interventional pain treatment, such as caudal and lumbar spine drug injection, single nerve block, stellate ganglion block, or neurolysis Diagnostic block anesthesia of articular nerve or articular surface can also be performed during diagnosis. In the operating room, it is also possible to conduct hard ridge film development inspection, vertebral foramen drug injection, or radiofrequency thermocoagulation, cauterization and other treatment methods such as intervertebral disc, nerve root and nerve plexus through the positioning guidance of radiation. According to the pathological mechanism of pain, combined with interventional pain treatment, it can effectively relieve acute and chronic pain, reduce the use of oral drugs, and help patients get a better quality of life.

        Far Eastern Memorial Hospital provides cross disciplinary integrated pain care. In addition to assisting inpatients in other specialties to deal with pain problems, it also sets up three outpatient periods, in which physicians from the pain department and imaging medicine department with rich clinical experience provide drug treatment, as well as interventional precise treatment such as ultrasound or radiation positioning, to alleviate the discomfort and discomfort caused by pain for patients.