digg Pulsing Away Pain

[ronr]

Reported May 25, 2010
http://www.ivanhoe.com/channels/p_channelstory.cfm?storyid=24202

BOCA RATON, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Last summer, an FDA panel voted to advise a ban on percocet and vicodin, two of the most commonly-used prescription pain pills in the world. The drugs, they say, are too toxic to the liver. That bold step left many patients -- and their doctors -- wondering how best to treat chronic pain.

One treatment that's gaining popularity is pulsed radiofrequency. For many patients, it's just the kind of relief they've been looking for.

"Pain essentially envelopes a person's complete living circumstances," Berger, M.D.,
pain management specialist at Pain Management Consultants in Boca Raton, FL said.

But Doctor Berger gives many patients relief with pulsed radiofrequency. It targets the nerves.

"They are essentially rendered short-circuited to transmitting painful impulses," Berger explained.

During the treatment, doctors insert a needle near the problem nerve. An electric current then heats the nerve. This is a newer version of standard radiofrequency, which destroys the nerve. Unlike the old treatment, pulsed radiofrequency simply shocks the nerve.

"It does not produce significant enough heat to destroy any tissues in the body," Berger said.

Complications are rare, but there is a chance the surgeon could damage blood vessels or other nerves. Infection is also a risk. The procedure takes about five minutes, and relief is often felt within two to three weeks. For Rockman, the relief was even quicker. 

[foxgrove]

Interesting.. Since the risks are pretty much the same as with a rhizotomy (burning the nerve) I wonder what the differences in effecacy are.  Longer pain relief.. faster.. better pain relief?? I just don't know.. I haven't found anything yet but I'm still looking..

[RandallS]

If the US FDA did end up banning percocet, the ban never reached our area out here in the boonies of S central USA.  I've been getting percocet from my dr & pharmacy for 6-7 mths no problem.   Maybe that FDA panel got outvoted in the end.

[Noah_Scape]

Sorry about going off topic, but Vicodon and Percocet are just two of many opiates, but those two are both "derived artificially" and not from the poppy plant opium. Morphine and heroin ARE from the opium poppy.

Artificial opiates are simply harder on the liver, just like more pharmaceutical drugs.

The other artificial opiate is Oxycontin. It has caused a lot of problems.

I think the natural substances are more "well tolerated", esp. that there is less liver damage. Humans evolved alongside the opium poppy, but not the substances created in labs.