Staff Directory
Department of Pain Medicine and Palliative Care
Phillips Ambulatory Care Center
10 Union Square East (at 14th Street), Suite 4K
New York, NY 10003
Get Map and Directions
(212) 844-8930
Clinical Programs in the
Pain Division
Chronic nonmalignant pain can have devastating effects on patients' quality
of life. The specialty of pain management has developed in medicine and
other disciplines to address the need for comfort, functional restoration
and treatment of associated problems.
The Pain Division offers specialized multidisciplinary treatment approaches
for a wide variety of chronic pain problems, including all types of low
back or neck pain, diverse types of neuropathic pain, fibromyalgia and
myofascial pain, persistent abdominal or pelvic pain, and other chronic
pain syndromes.
The multidisciplinary teams that staff these programs include neurologists,
anesthesiologists, rehabilitation medicine physicians, a psychologist,
advance practice nurses, and a social worker. Physical therapists and
an acupuncturist are available. Based on a careful assessment, the team
offers a treatment approach tailored to the patient's diagnosis and targeted
to the patient's specific physical and psychosocial condition. The goals
are to reduce pain, improve functioning, enhance the quality of life,
and reduce dependence on the health care system.
Treatment approaches include:
- Expertise in drug therapy for pain, including nonopioid and opioid
drugs.
- Psychological interventions, including cognitive approaches such
as biofeedback and hypnosis, and formal psychotherapy.
- Access to rehabilitative therapies including physical therapy,
occupational therapy, and treatment with analgesic modalities such
as transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS), ultrasound,
and others.
- Interventional pain relieving treatments, including injections,
nerve blocks, spinal stimulators, and spinal infusions using implanted
pumps.
- Access to complementary approaches, including acupuncture, massage,
and other modalities.
Clinical Programs in the Palliative Care Division
Palliative care is a treatment model focused on the care of patients with
all types of progressive incurable diseases, including cancer; AIDS; advanced
diseases of the heart, lungs, kidney and liver; and neurodegenerative
diseases, such as dementia. Palliative care includes a broad range of
interventions that together help the patient and family maintain a good
quality of life while living with the disease, and allow the patient with
advanced illness to face the end of life with comfort ensured, values
and decisions respected, and the family supported.
Palliative care is an evolving specialty in medicine and other disciplines.
To provide patients with specialist-level palliative care, the DPMPC offers
a Palliative Care Consultation Service for inpatients at Beth Israel Medical
Center and referral to Continuum Hospice Care/The Jacob Perlow Hospice
for both inpatients and outpatients. Referral to a specialized program
in palliative care offers patients expertise in pain and symptom control,
coordination of multiple interventions to address the diverse problems
associated with serious illness, and assistance with advance care planning
and other end-of-life concerns.
The Palliative Care Consultation Service offers assessment and management
by a team that includes physicians, a nurse, a social worker, a chaplain,
and a music therapist. Follow-up in an outpatient practice can be arranged
after discharge. Patients have access to an 18-bed inpatient hospice,
palliative care, and pain unit at Beth Israel Medical Center, where patients
with acute problems, such as severe uncontrolled pain, can be admitted
and treated by specialists in palliative care.
Continuum Hospice
Care/The Jacob Perlow Hospice provides access to New York City's largest
hospice, and the only program of its kind offering an Open Access policy.
Open Access means that admission to the hospice program is permitted if
the patient meets the regulatory requirements of terminal illness and
wishes to elect this type of care. Following admission, any type of treatment
may be given, if appropriate, while patients receive a full range of hospice
services, including home-based treatment by an interdisciplinary team;
medications, supplies and equipment at no cost; and access to inpatients
beds. Family member gain access to bereavement services for 13 months
after a patient's death.
The DPMPC also maintains a Family Caregiver
Program for the family caregivers of selected patients. This program
attempts to meet the informational and support needs of caregivers through
a website, www.NetofCare.org, and
other services.
The
treatment model implemented by the Palliative Care Division continually
addresses unmet needs—physical, psychological, social, and spiritual—that
evolve during the disease. At a weekly Palliative Care Division meeting,
patients are discussed by the members of the team, who continually adjust
the care plan as needed. Our certified hospice program offers an array
of services to eligible patients, including access to an interdisciplinary
team while at home; drugs, supplies and equipment at no cost; access to
aides and other services; and bereavement support for the family.
In an effort to improve the access of Hospice patients to the physicians
who specialize in palliative care, the Division is piloting a new entity
called the Hospice Drop-In Program. When a home care nurse perceives that
a patient may benefit from a consultation by a physician specialist, he
or she may arrange for a visit to one of the Division's physicians on
an ad hoc basis, without delay. Transportation will be arranged for this
visit when needed. If the patient is under the care of a physician who
is not in the Department, prior approval for this visit will be obtained,
and the result will be a physician-to-physician contact, including a written
report, that may help improve care.
Following a death in the hospice, the family is contacted by our bereavement
program. BIMC is exploring the role of such services throughout the institution,
and the Department will provide leadership for the development of this
effort.
Our academic mission is furthered by the efforts of researchers and educators
in the
Institute for Education and Research in Pain and Palliative Care. These
efforts are focused on education of professionals, patients and families, and
the community at large, and on research into diverse clinical issues related
to pain or palliative care.
Department of Pain Medicine and Palliative Care
Beth Israel Medical Center
First Avenue at 16th Street
New York, NY 10003
(212) 844-8930
Email: StopPain@chpnet.org
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