A surprising new Harris Poll reveals that more than one in four U.S. adults (28%) suffer from chronic low back pain – affecting more people than diabetes and heart disease combined. That’s more than 72.3 million adults, far higher than previous estimates, and more than a third have never been told what causes their back pain and 84% say they wish there were better treatment options available. In fact, anesthesiologists who are pain medicine specialists offer many alternatives for pain management that don’t include opioids, from surgery to pain blocks.
One alternative is minimally invasive lumbar decompression for spinal stenosis, a condition that can severely limit mobility as people age, yet only 5% said they’d had the treatment. Leading pain medicine specialist David Dickerson, M.D., chair of the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ Committee on Pain Medicine, is among the top four or five pain doctors in the world with that level of experience. But he notes this procedure is one of many treatment options for low back pain.
The “Mobility Matters: Chronic Low Back Pain in America” survey was sponsored by Vertos Medical as part of its national health awareness campaign, Know Your Back Story, and the data was used to generate a Mobility Index from 0 (no mobility) to 100 (highest level of mobility), which averaged 57 for those with chronic low back pain vs. 76.4 for those without the condition. Dr. Dickerson, who also is a consultant for Vertos, is available to talk about the many ways anesthesiologists and other pain management specialists can help patients manage pain and keep moving as they age with limited or no use of opioids. He can discuss:
- High-tech methods such as radio waves, nerve blocks and spinal cord stimulation
- Alternatives such as physical therapy and acupuncture
- Minimally invasive lumbar decompression and other surgical procedures, and when they are most appropriate
- Non-opioid pain medications
- Why mobility matters as we age
