| Illinois Pain & Spine Institute

07 Feb Melding Medicine and Politics to Create a Safer Society: Interview with Dr. Prunskis

Posted at 20:44h in Illinois Pain Institute

John Prunskis, M.D. FIPP, co-founder of the Illinois Pain Institute, recently had the honor of sharing his story with Bridges, a Lithuanian-American news journal based in the United States. In it, Dr. Prunskis discusses not just his medical career and approach to the precise diagnosis...

26 Jan The Real Cost of the Opioid Epidemic is More Than Previously Estimated

Posted at 18:48h in Opioids

What is the true economic cost of America’s opioid epidemic? According to the White House’s Council of Economic Advisors (CEA), it’s significantly more than was previously thought. In a report released in November, 2017, the CEA estimates that the toll of the opioid crisis in...

17 Jan The Opiate Databank: How a Bill Becomes a Law

Posted at 00:34h in Illinois Pain Institute

The United States is in the midst of an ever-worsening opioid epidemic. As addicted patients and drug dealers continue to seek to abuse narcotic pain medications, it’s up to care providers and legislative bodies to put barriers in their path and prevent opioids from getting...

17 Jan Advances in Neuromodulation Mean Less Reliance on Opioid Medications

Posted at 00:32h in Treatments

One of the most important steps toward cutting back on opioid dependence is offering pain sufferers other, better options for managing their discomfort. One alternative that is increasingly getting recognized for its effectiveness is neuromodulation – implanted medical devices that use electrical stimulation to block...

17 Jan Opioids are a Massive Problem, and Doctors Do Have Many Other Options

Posted at 00:18h in Opioids

There are a lot of debates when it comes to how to best treat pain, but one thing is clear: opioid drugs, long relied on for their ability to block pain signals to the brain, are a problem of epidemic proportions. In 2014 alone, 47,000...

13 Apr Pain Management of Veterans

Posted at 19:11h in Opioids

Studies show that soldiers and veterans have some of the highest rates of opioid use in the United States. A 2011 report by the American Public Health Association stated that the fatal overdose rate of opioids among veterans is nearly double the national average, mostly...

24 Feb Opioids & Neuropathic Pain

Posted at 18:57h in Opioids

Neuropathic pain—a state of complex, chronic pain caused by damage or disease affecting the somatosensory nervous system—may not be fully manageable with opioid therapy alone. A study conducted by researchers from the University of Alberta and published in Pain Medicine found that while opioids do...

28 Jan Long-Term Opioid Use & Depression

Posted at 16:21h in Opioids

Part of well-balanced healthcare is evaluating short-term benefits against long-term potentialities. In the case of opioids, a study by Jeffrey Scherrer, PhD, et al. published in The Annals of Family Medicine shows a relationship between long durations of use and the development of new-onset depression....

28 Jan Opioid Use and Low Testosterone

Posted at 02:49h in Opioids

Is there a connection between opioid use and low testosterone? It looks that way, according to a study recently published in Pain Medicine. Maria Soledad Cepeda, MD, PhD, et al. compared the testosterone levels of two subject groups—those who had taken prescription opioids in the...

13 Jan Opioid-to-Heroin Connection

Posted at 18:33h in Opioids

Think of a "typical" heroin user. Now think again. According to a recently published study in Drug and Alcohol Dependence, there has been an increase in heroin abuse among whites, women, and people of high socio-economic statuses. It's a far cry from the urban street...

Opioids Tag