Who is a pain management specialist?
A pain management specialist is a medical specialist who diagnoses pain and treats various pain-related problems. These specialists can treat sudden, long-lasting, and chronic pain. They use a combination of medications, therapy, specific procedures, and exercises to address pain.
After graduating from medical school, pain management specialists obtain hands-on training in neurology, anesthesiology, physical medicine, and rehabilitation. They then finish one more year of training focusing on pain treatment to get a certification from the American Board of Pain Medicine.
There are three broad categories of pain-related problems – direct tissue injuries such as arthritis, nervous system disorders injuries such as stroke, or a combination of these two, such as back pain. Pain medicine specialists treat conditions like neck pain, fibromyalgia, neuropathic pain, chronic migraines and headaches, musculoskeletal pain, pinched nerve, and abdominal pain. You can also consult them for postoperative pain management, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), TMJ and chronic facial pain, and central pain syndrome.
Pain patients usually receive treatment in outpatient clinics that have diagnostic equipment such as ultrasound and X-ray imaging. Sometimes, the pain specialist may practice in a hospital setting.
What is pain, its types, and its causes?
Pain is a complex and subjective experience. It can take multiple forms, ranging from moderate to unbearable, and may be caused by diverse factors. However, it generally originates from the stimulation of the nervous system.
Broadly categorized, pain can be classified as acute, chronic, nociceptive, neuropathic, or functional:
- Acute pain: Acute pain emerges rapidly, often due to injuries like cuts or fractures, illnesses like strep throat, or medical procedures like surgery. Sharp sensations characterize it, and it typically resolves within days, weeks, or months after addressing the underlying cause. Almost everyone encounters acute pain in their lifetime.
- Chronic pain persists over an extended period, frequently beyond the expected healing time. It can result from conditions like arthritis, fibromyalgia, cancer, or chronic migraines. Managing chronic pain requires a multidisciplinary approach, addressing physical and psychological aspects.
- Nociceptive pain: It is a result of tissue damage or inflammation. It can be further classified into somatic and visceral pain. Somatic pain originates from the skin, muscles, bones, tendons, ligaments, or joints. Conversely, visceral pain arises from internal organs, generating sensations of pressure or deep aches.
- Neuropathic pain: It results from damage or malfunction in the nervous system. Conditions such as shingles, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, cancer, or slipped discs fall into this category. This pain is typically described as burning, shooting, or tingling and can be challenging to manage.
- Functional pain: Functional pain refers to discomfort that arises without evident injury or physical damage to the body. It is chronic but can also occur acutely. Examples of functional pain syndromes include fibromyalgia, characterized by widespread body pain; irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), resulting in abdominal pain; temporomandibular dysfunction, leading to jaw pain; and chronic cardiac chest pain, causing discomfort in the chest.
Pain serves as a signal indicating an underlying issue in the body. Effective treatment involves addressing the root cause, which may heal naturally or require medical interventions. If the cause of pain is unidentified, healthcare professionals can assist in developing pain management plans. Individuals can consider visiting a pain clinic for specialized care.
What is a pain clinic?
These are healthcare centers that specialize in diagnosing and managing chronic pain. They are also known as pain management clinics. There are two varieties: one focuses on treating specific types of pain, like neck and back pain, and the other, frequently called an interdisciplinary clinic, looks at the whole person.
Frequently, your pain management team will include:
- Nurses and physicians
- Psychologists
- Therapists of physical therapy
- Therapists who specialize in occupational and vocational rehabilitation
- Dietitians and nutritionists
These clinics can help you manage your pain with physical, behavioral, and psychological therapy in addition to drugs.
Types of pain management techniques
Your pain management specialist may work in collaboration with your primary care doctor. If you have severe or long-term pain, you may need to see multiple pain management doctors. They may use one technique or a combination of different methods to provide you with much-needed pain relief. Some pain-management strategies include:
- Exercise: The specialist might suggest tai chi, swimming, yoga, or pilates to relieve chronic pain. These exercises also have other benefits, such as better posture, enhanced mental health, and overall well-being.
- Home remedies: These can relieve some types of pain, such as those caused by bone, muscle, or soft tissue injuries, that can be relieved with rest and cold compresses. Keeping the affected part elevated also helps.
- Therapy and counseling: Your pain management specialist might recommend changing how your mind reacts to physical discomfort. Biofeedback and cognitive behavioral therapy can help in these cases. They may also suggest other kinds of treatment and counseling to help combat issues such as depression and anxiety brought on by chronic pain. The doctor might ask you to start a pain diary to track what makes the pain worse or less. Tracking can help in planning appropriate treatment.
- Lifestyle changes: In some instances, losing weight and getting a good night's rest can help alleviate pain. Your specialist might suggest eating a healthy diet, consuming plenty of fluids, and staying hydrated.
- Hands-on treatments: Massages, physical therapy, chiropractic adjustments, acupuncture, and osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT) can relieve pain. These techniques also improve alignment and encourage the body to work better.
- Medications: Your pain management specialist may suggest over-the-counter (OTC) and prescription medicines to relieve discomfort. In cases of infections or inflammation, antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medications might be necessary.
- Injections or stimulations: The doctor might use procedures using radiofrequency or electrical technology to ease nerve pain. Steroid injections can deliver pain medication directly to the affected area.
While complete elimination of pain is usually impossible, these methods can help you cope with the pain and resume your routine. Some of these pain management techniques may come with risks and side effects. Talk to your pain management specialist about any concerns before you proceed with the treatment.
How do pain medicines work?
There are different types of pain medicines. All of these work differently to help relieve pain. Some pain medicines that specialists often prescribe are:
- Acetaminophen (Tylenol): There are many theories on how acetaminophen relieves pain. Researchers believe that it attaches itself to a variation of an enzyme involved in pain known as cyclooxygenase-3 (COX-3). This serves as an obstacle in the pathway leading to prostaglandin production in the central nervous system. Prostaglandins are natural chemicals produced by the body that are linked to pain and swelling. Thus, they are helpful in providing pain relief. However, this theory is yet to be confirmed.
- NSAIDs: Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are administered in various forms, such as oral capsules, tablets, rectal suppositories, suspensions, and IV injections. They also block cyclooxygenase to treat inflammation-related pain. Besides, these drugs can cause side effects, such as nausea, upset stomach, ulcers, hypertension, blood clots, dizziness, and allergic reactions.
- Opioids: Opioids activate "mu receptors" that are located in the nervous system and are usually involved in pain. In other words, opioids block pain signals from reaching the central nervous system. They also have various forms, including IV morphine, oral opioids, intramuscular injections, and fentanyl. Out of these, IV morphine acts the fastest, providing pain relief within 5–10 minutes. Nonetheless, interference with the dosage recommended can have life-threatening consequences.
- Antiseizure medications: Pregabalin (Lyrica) and gabapentin (Gralise) are two antiseizure medications. Doctors prescribe them for nerve pain. They work by lowering the release of excitatory neurotransmitters in the central nervous system. The excitatory neurotransmitters are proteins involved in nerve pain. Antiseizure medications take a long time to start working and have side effects like dizziness, fluid buildup in the arms or legs, and fatigue.
- Antidepressants: There are different types of antidepressant medicines, but the ones that doctors prescribe for nerve pain are amitriptyline (Elavil) and duloxetine (Cymbalta). They act on neurotransmitters like serotonin and noradrenaline, determining the intensity of pain a person feels. They take weeks to work and come with side effects like nausea, headache, and increased risk of suicidal thoughts.
How to choose a pain specialist
Your primary doctor can advise you on which type of expert you require and possibly refer you to one. When selecting a practitioner, you should learn about their overall approach to pain management and how they would treat you particularly. Choose a doctor who:
- Has the necessary training and experience to treat your particular type of pain, most will have completed a pain medicine fellowship, which is additional training beyond a doctor's specialization.
- Has "board certification," implying they've completed extensive exams in physical medicine and rehabilitation, neurology, or anesthesiology
- Listens well and appears trustworthy
- Has a good reputation in the medical community
- Encourages you to inquire
- Allows for disagreement
Moreover, choosing a pain management specialist near you will ensure timely and convenient access to personalized and expert care.
Preparing for your first pain specialist visit
Bring a copy of your old medical records, including any X-rays, to your initial session. Note all the medications, herbs, and supplements you use. It can be beneficial to keep a pain diary to document how you feel each passing day.
The specialist will examine you and discuss your pain, during which they will want to know the following:
- Where does it hurt
- How it feels (for example, are you experiencing a burning sensation, aches, pins and needles, pounding, tightness, or tenderness)
- When your pain first began
- How bad it is (on a scale ranging from 0 to 10; 0 indicates absence of discomfort, and 10 represents the worst imaginable)
- What do you believe caused it
- What do you believe caused it
- Any medicines that you are taking for it
- What makes it worse or better
Finding the right pain management specialist near you in Chicago, IL
Living with chronic pain can seriously impact the quality of your life. However, a trained and experienced pain management specialist can help alleviate pain and restore your daily routine. If you cannot locate such a doctor near you, Zocdoc might be able to help.
To get started, set up a free account on Zocdoc and provide us with details such as your location, condition, or symptoms. The advanced algorithm combs through our extensive database of practitioners to give you a list of top-rated experts tailored to your needs. You can also use our convenient filters to search for a specialist based on gender, languages spoken, location, and hospital affiliations.
Zocdoc also has an insurance detector to help you find in-network providers. However, even though adding your insurance information to your Zocdoc account can simplify finding in-network providers, many offices will still insist on bringing your insurance card to the doctor's appointment. Visit Zocdoc's patient help center if you face any insurance-related trouble.
Click on individual profiles to learn more about the doctor's educational qualifications and experience, and check the verified patient reviews and ratings to make your choice. Zocdoc lets you book a virtual appointment before scheduling an in-person session. You will likely find specialists available on weekends and outside regular business hours.
Thanks to Zocdoc, locating the best pain management specialist near you is now easier! Bookings made on Zocdoc are simple, free, and secure.
Statistics on the burden of chronic pain and arthritis in Illinois and the United States
Data from the National Health Interview Survey of 2019 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicates that 20.4% of adults had chronic pain, while 7.4% had high-impact chronic pain. High-impact chronic pain can often limit an individual's work and life activities. Around 21.7% of women reported chronic pain, a higher figure than men.
Arthritis is a prime cause of chronic pain and impaired function among adults in the United States. According to another CDC National Health Interview Survey, the prevalence of arthritis among the adult population in the United States was roughly 18.9% in 2022. The same source revealed that the prevalence of this condition increases with age; while 3.6% of adults between 18 and 34 had arthritis, the percentage was much higher in people over 75 (53.9%). The report further stated that arthritis was more common among women (21.5%) than men (16.1%) in the U.S.
Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) statistics for 2023 support this prediction. The state-wise figures by gender indicate that nearly 28.4% of women in Illinois reported having arthritis as opposed to about 20.5% of men. Approximately 24.5% of all adults in the state reported having arthritis.
Sources
National Spine & Pain Centers
Cleveland Clinic
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention[1]
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention[2]
Kaiser Family Foundation
WebMD [1]
WebMD [2]
Healthline
Medical News Today
