Pain Management
Effective pain management is best achieved by a team approach involving the patient, his/her family, and health care providers. Besides mitigating suffering, pain control is crucial because even when the underlying disease process is stable, uncontrolled pain prevents patients from working productively, enjoying recreation, or taking pleasure in their usual role in the family and society.
Treatment of chronic pain often involves the use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS) and opiod analgesics. Optimal treatment for a particular form of pain may involve the use of medications that possess pain-relieving properties, including gabapentin, ketamine, and lidocaine. By combining various agents which utilize different mechanisms to alter the sensation of pain, physicians have found the smaller concentrations of each medication can be used. Adjuvant drugs – including antihistamines and corticosteroids – are valuable during all phases of pain management to enhance pain relief, treat concurrent symptoms, and counteract the side effects.
“Pain can be managed. Physicians must determine the severity and frequency of their patients’ pain experience to prescribe the most important and effective pain management regimen. Pain treatment needs to be individualized.”
- Kathleen Foley, M.D.,
Professor and Neurologist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Our compounding specialists offer many unique options for pain management.