Neuropathic Pain

Neuropathic pain refers to pain that develops after an injury to the nervous system, including the brain, spinal cord, and nerves. It can develop in any part of the body.

Most pain that we experience on a daily basis is nociceptive rather than neuropathic. Stubbing your toe, for example, may cause aching or throbbing that lasts for a few moments and then gradually disappears. Neuropathic pain, by contrast, continues long after the injury that caused it. It may be accompanied by abnormal sensations: burning or cold, tingling, numbness, itchiness, and others. We think that neuropathic pain occurs because part of the nervous system gets stuck in a loop, constantly sending pain signals to the brain.

There are many possible causes of neuropathic pain: surgery, trauma, infection, metabolic disorders such as diabetes (i.e. diabetic peripheral neuropathy), nerve or spinal cord injury, stroke, multiple sclerosis, and others. Distinguishing between neuropathic pain and nociceptive pain is important, because the two are treated differently.

Treatment of neuropathic pain often focuses on re-training the nervous system to help interrupt the pain signals bombarding the brain. The most common way to do this is to apply carefully targeted pulses of electricity to the nerves or spinal cord, an approach called neuromodulation.

I use several forms of neuromodulation for pain, including spinal cord stimulation, motor cortex stimulation, and trigeminal and occipital nerve stimulation. The choice of therapy depends on the part of the body that is affected, the patient’s anatomy, previous therapies that have been tried, and other factors. Please visit one of the links above to learn more about these treatments.

If you have chronic neuropathic pain and live near Denver, please consider meeting me in consultation to learn more about treatment options.