Your nerves are supposed to relay important information about your physical condition from various areas of your body back to your brain. When this system works correctly, you pull your hand back from something hot that could burn you, or you realize you’ve cut yourself and need first aid.
However, some people develop problems with overactive nerves that send out pain signals even when there’s not a physical issue present. If you continue to experience constant or intermittent pain for 12 weeks without a clear cause, you’re said to suffer from chronic pain.
At Performance Pain & Sports Medicine, our team of interventional pain management specialists works with new and existing patients with chronic back pain and other chronic pain problems.
With the support of PPSM founder Dr. Matthias Wiederholz, co-founder Dr. Suzanne Manzi, and the PPSM team, you can explore effective treatment options to calm your overactive nerves and relieve your chronic pain.
Dr. Wiederholz and Dr. Manzi see new and existing patients from our locations in Houston, Texas, and Raritan, New Jersey, and offer treatment options including spinal cord stimulation (SCS) with the HFX™ system. Could this procedure resolve your pain for good? Here’s what you need to know.
Nerves from all over your body come together in the area of your spine. With spinal cord stimulation, low-level electrical impulses override overactive nerves, preventing misfired pain signals from reaching your brain and ending or reducing your pain.
Spinal cord stimulation often provides effective or even total pain relief for people with chronic pain in their arms, legs, or upper or lower back. SCS has a high success rate overall. And your chances get even higher with HFX, which boasts a clinically-proven benefit over other SCS systems in terms of quality and duration of chronic back pain relief.
However, you should also know that spinal cord stimulation is variably effective for different patients’ pain management needs. To find out if spinal cord stimulation is right for you, your provider starts with an SCS trial.
If spinal cord stimulation works for you, it offers several benefits above other treatment options for chronic back pain. You won’t need to risk failed back surgery or deal with extensive surgical recovery, for one thing. And, SCS also helps to reduce dependence on pain management drugs in many patients, minimizing your risks of addiction and complicating side effects.
At PPSM, we use HFX's comprehensive SCS technology, including the Senza® Spinal Cord Stimulation system, FDA-approved as an effective treatment for chronic pain. When you’re ready to have your long-term SCS device put in place, we insert small electrodes into the area of your spinal canal and position your generator device at the top of your buttocks.
Your permanent SCS device is around the same size as a pacemaker. The entire SCS delivery system is removable and may be able to be controlled with a simple remote. SCS implantation is a same-day procedure performed under local anesthesia only.
To learn more about how you can end your cycle of nerve activation and chronic pain with SCS treatment, get in touch with the team at Performance Pain & Sports Medicine today. Schedule your initial consultation by contacting us online, or call our location most convenient to you today.
