New Books

Breaking News

This section includes a wide variety of pain management stories, arranged by date and type (not significance), which have appeared in the popular media (print, broadcast, and on-line) in the last month. Because of the volume of stories, only the first few are included on the main page. Be sure to click on "More Stories" at the bottom of each front page section.

Pain Studies In The News

Spending for outpatient prescription painkillers and medicines that treat aches and pains increased from $4.2 billion in 1996 to $13.2 billion in 2006
February 12, 2009 [Source: AHRQ]
Newswise — Expenditures for outpatient prescription analgesics – commonly known as painkillers and medicines that treat aches and pains – increased from $4.2 billion in 1996 to $13.2 billion in 2006, according to the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. These medications include narcotic analgesics, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and Cox-2 inhibitors, among others. Story

Have migraine? Bigger waistline may be linked
13 Feb 2009 [Source: American Academy of Neurology's]
Overweight people who are between the ages of 20 and 55 may have a higher risk of experiencing migraine headaches, according to a recent study The study found that age, gender and the way that body fat is distributed affected the risk of migraine. Those who were 20 to 55 years of age and who had larger waistlines were more likely to have migraine attacks, on average, than people of the same age who had smaller waistlines. Story

More Pain Studies In The News

Pain Stories In The News

New guidelines for prescribing opioid pain drugs published
February 10, 2009 [Source: American Pain Society]
The American Pain Society and American Academy of Pain have published the first comprehensive clinical practice guideline to assist clinicians in prescribing potent opioid pain medications for patients with chronic non-cancer pain. The guidelines are based on the available evidence and also rely on an underlying assumption that chronic opioid therapy requires prescribers to have clinical skills and knowledge in both the principles of opioid treatment and the assessment and management of risks associated with opioid abuse, addiction and diversion. Story

Finding effective treatment for your chronic pain
February 10, 2009 [Source: U.S. News and World Report]
Studies are underway to look into the effectiveness of alternative ways of delivering pain medications. Story

More Pain Stories In The News

Policy and Law

F.D.A. to place new limits on prescriptions of narcotics February 10, 2009 [Source: New York Times/FDA]
February 10, 2009 [Source: New York Times/FDA]
Many doctors may lose their ability to prescribe 24 popular narcotics as part of a new effort to reduce the deaths and injuries that result from these medicines’ inappropriate use, federal drug officials announced. Story

National Pain Care Act reintroduced in Congress
February 3, 2009 [Source: Office of Congresswoman Lois Capp]
Today Congresswoman Lois Capps (D-CA) and Congressman Mike Rogers (R-MI) reintroduced the National Pain Care Policy Act of 2009, legislation to improve pain care research, education, training, access, outreach and care. Story

Clinical Trial Reports

Endo Pharmaceuticals announces research collaborations to develop novel pain treatments and discover potential cancer treatments
February 10, 2009 [Source: Endo Pharnaceuticals]
Endo Pharmaceuticals hasannounced today that it has signed two research collaboration agreements with Harvard University and Aurigene Discovery Technologies Ltd (ADT) to develop novel treatments for pain and to discover potential treatments for cancer. The Harvard agreement focuses upon a pain-drug delivery system that targets pain-sensing neurons without affecting motor neurons while ADT will be aimed at discovering novel drug candidates to treat cancer. Story

Ranbaxy says gets US approval for migraine drug
February 10, 2009 [Source: Reuters/Ranbaxy Laboratories]
Ranbaxy Laboratories India's top drugmaker by sales, has received the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's approval to sell acute migraine drug sumatriptan. Story

More Clinical Trial Reports

New Issues of Online Full-Text Periodicals

The Beacon
(January 27, 2009 – Emerging Solutions in Pain)
Content:
• Jennifer Bolen, JD, discusses the legal requirements of informed consent and treatment agreements;
• Are some opioids more abusable than others?
• Does the DEA monitor opioid prescribing and target doctors who prescribe in excess of a specific quantitative threshold?
• Do state or federal laws/regulations require me to have an opioid agreement for patients who are prescribed opioids for pain?
• If a patient who is actively enrolled in methadone maintenance for opioid addiction is in need of pain treatment, are opioids automatically precluded for his/her pain therapy?
• What should a physician do if he or she finds out that a prescription has been stolen and a pharmacy faxes in a copy that shows that the writing is not the physician’s? How can the physician protect him or herself? Issue

Pain Community News
(Winter 2009 - American Pain Foundation)
Articles:
• Finding Purpose
• Coping with Pain around the Holidays
• A Hero’s First Holiday
• Fast Facts on Amputation/Phantom Limb Pain
• Ask a Lawyer
• Top 10 Tips to Help Restore Intimacy
• Targeting Pain at Work. Issue

Research Abstracts Stay up-to-date on the latest research! This section of Currents offers complete abstracts on a wide variety of pain and pain management topics that have been selected from the National Library of Medicine. All Abstracts

Some include:

Elomaa MM, de C Williams AC, Kalso EA.
Attention management as a treatment for chronic pain. Abstract

Ernst E.
Massage therapy for cancer palliation and supportive care: a systematic review of randomised clinical trials. Abstract

Fary RE, Briffa NK, Briffa TG.
Effectiveness of pulsed electrical stimulation in the management of osteoarthritis of the knee: three case reports. Abstract

Hagen KB, Byfuglien MG, Falzon L, et al.
Dietary interventions for rheumatoid arthritis. Abstract

Häuser W, Bernardy K, Arnold B, et al.
Efficacy of multicomponent treatment in fibromyalgia syndrome: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled clinical trials. Abstract

Manchikanti L, Manchikanti KN, Pampati V, et al.
Prevalence of side effects of prolonged low or moderate dose opioid therapy with concomitant benzodiazepine and/or antidepressant therapy in chronic non-cancer pain. Abstract

172 Research Abstracts

Legislative and Administrative Updates

Branch of Government: United States. House
Title: National Pain Care Policy Act of 2009 (House Bill 756)
Summary: A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act with respect to pain care
Sponsor: Capps
Status: 01/28/2009 Introduced in the House. [full text]

Branch of Government: Colorado. House
Title: Alternative Therapies For Medicaid (House Bill 1047)
Summary: Establishes a pilot program to provide chiropractic care, massage therapy, and acupuncture to an eligible person with a spinal cord injury (pilot program). Specifies criteria for identifying eligible persons. Directs the medical services board to adopt rules to administer the pilot program, including defining complementary and alternative therapies. Requires the department of health care policy and financing (department) to report to specified committees of the general assembly.
Sponsor: Todd
Status: 01/07/2009 Introduced.
01/07/2009 To House Committee on Health and Human Services
01/26/2009 From House Committee on Health and Human Services: Reported favorably. 01/26/2009 To House Committee on Appropriations. [full text]

More Legislative and Administrative Updates

New Practice Guidelines

Anesthesia
National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence [U.K.]
Ultrasound-guided regional nerve block
[Summary and recommendations]

Back Pain
Multinational Musculoskeletal Inception Cohort Study
A review and proposal for a core set of factors for prospective cohorts in low back pain: A consensus statement
[Summary and recommendations]

Nervous System Diseases
National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (U.K.)
Spinal cord stimulation for chronic pain of neuropathic or ischaemic origin
[Summary and recommendations]

New Clinical Trials

Alabama

Musculoskeletal Diseases
City: Anniston
Summary: A study comparing tapentadol IR, oxycodone IR, and placebo for treating acute pain from vertebral compression fracture associated with osteoporosis.

City: Birmingham
Summary: A study comparing tapentadol IR, oxycodone IR, and placebo for treating acute pain from vertebral compression fracture associated with osteoporosis.

City: Haleyville
Summary: A study comparing tapentadol IR, oxycodone IR, and placebo for treating acute pain from vertebral compression fracture associated with osteoporosis.

More New Clinical Trials

New Books

Gary J. McCleane
Pain Management: Expanding the Pharmacological Options
June 2008, Wiley-Blackwell
Description: Conventional pharmaceutical approaches to pain management are not always successful. Using only those medications that have an official indication for a certain condition reduces substantially the chance of the patient gaining pain relief and may expose them to intolerable side effects. However evidence now exists on the use of other drugs, produced for non-pain conditions, and how they can substantially increase the chances of pain relief.

Covering the most recent developments in this field, McCleane offers an alternative solution to pain treatment when conventional treatments fail. This pioneering book proposes evidence-based alternatives to current options in pain management, using well-grounded rationales for each given treatment.

This book is an ideal reference for the specialist and non-specialist prescriber alike and for practitioners from a wide variety of disciplines. It provides the evidence required and treatment algorithms for readers to use the drugs appropriately and to explore the field if they wish. More info.

Save 10% by using the code PAIN9 when ordering the book from www.Wiley.com. This offer expires 03/30/09.

Lagniappe (A little something extra)

I feel your pain: neural mechanisms of empathy
January 29, 2009 [Source: Department of Clinical Neurophysiology and Pain Center at the Pitie-Salpetriere in Paris, France]
Brain-imaging studies have shown similar patterns of brain activity when subjects feel their own emotions or observe the same emotions in others. It has been suggested that a person who has never experienced a specific feeling would have a difficult time directly empathizing with a person through a "mirror matching" mechanism that requires previous experience and would instead have to rely on a higher inferential processes called "perspective taking." Story

Clinical trials: unfavorable results often go unpublished
January 20, 2009 [Source: UK Cochrane Centre ]
An international team of researchers carried out a systematic review of all the existing research in this area. In addition to showing that negative results were published less often, they found that if these results were eventually published, they would take between one and four more years to appear in journals than studies showing positive results. Story

Messages often muddled in doctor-patient talks
January 12, 2009 [Arthritis & Rheumatism]
After 74 meetings between people with severe arthritis of the knee and physicians to discuss treatment, nearly 20 percent of the time, the patient and physician disagreed on whether or not the doctor had recommended knee replacement surgery. Story

People are more suggestible under laughing gas
January 9, 2008 [Source: University College London]
The pain-relieving effects of nitrous oxide – laughing gas – may be enhanced by suggestion or hypnosis, according to a new study by University College London. The study’s findings – that people are more suggestible under the gas – mean that dental patients may benefit from being coached to relax while undergoing sedation. Story

Editorial Team
Edward Duensing, Research
Lennie Duensing, Editorial

Design
Carol Harper, Art Direction
Katie Duensing, Data Input