The number of specialists may be insufficient to meet the needs of
the U.S. population with chronic pain. Investigators studied data about
board-certified pain physicians and their distribution. They compared
results of a mailed survey to U.S. pain specialists with U.S. Census
data and contrasted different settings and kinds of practices. The 750
pain specialists who responded (32.1%) were similar to the entire board-certified
group in age, location, and specialty. Although there were fewer pain
practices in rural areas, the prevalence was not related to other demographic
data.
Ninety-six percent of pain specialists treated chronic pain; 84% followed
patients long term; 31% worked in an academic setting; 50% had an interdisciplinary
practice; and 29% focused on one treament approach. Academics were mostly
neurologists. Pain specialists most likely to offer a single treatment
approach were anesthesiologists and were less likely to follow patients
long term or to prescribe controlled substances. Although board-certified
specialists receive similar training and must pass an examination, their
practices vary considerably. Breuer B, Pappagallo M, Tai JY, Portenoy
RK. Adapted from J Pain. 2007 Mar;8(3):244-50.
PMID: 17169616
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMed
Credit: PubMed, developed by the National Center for Biotechnology Information
(NCBI) at the National
Library of Medicine (NLM).
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