Identifying a pain specialist

Pain management is a new specialty of medicine that deals with the evaluation and treatment of people with acute or chronic pain. Acute pain usually follows surgery or injury and resolves as the body heals itself. Pain is chronic when it persists after healing has taken place. Cancer and certain degenerative diseases such as arthritis can also cause chronic pain.

All doctors and most health professionals are involved in treating pain but most have no formal training in pain management. A pain specialist may have several specialties, such as anesthesiology, neurology, neurosurgery, orthopedics, or physiatry. He or she has received at least a year of additional training specifically in pain management. Treating pain usually involves a team approach to manage not only the pain itself but such factors as anxiety, depression, family issues and quality of sleep—all of which can affect how we feel pain. A comprehensive treatment plan for treating pain may include medications, injections, psychological counseling, exercise programs, chiropractic treatment, physical therapy, massage and many other modalities.

Often, patients are not referred to a pain center until they have suffered needlessly for many months or years with pain. It is a goal of pain specialists and the Delaware Pain Initiative to educate patients and their health care providers that pain should be managed early and aggressively. Early referral to a pain center that offers comprehensive evaluation and treatment of pain, not just injections, is the best way to minimize the suffering and disability often associated with undertreated pain.