Pain conference. An example of an interdisciplinary cooperation

• Published in: Schmerz (Berlin, Germany) Germany), 2000-12, Vol.14 (6), p.429-434
• Main Authors: Hankemeier, U, Becklas, M, Richter, W, Manz, F
• Format: Article
• Language: ger
• ISSN: 0932-433X
• DOI: 10.1007/s004820070008

In the interdisciplinary Pain Conference, pain specialists of various disciplines discussed - partly in the presence of the concerned patient - explanations as to the cause of a specific pain. The following example portrays the events of the conference. In this case, despite extensive diagnostics, no explanation due to an organ failure could be found for a 74-year-pld man with worsening neurological pain above the knee. The patient's desire the change was so strong that after ineffective outpatient care and different operations, such as hernitomy, fibroma removal and the implantation of an epidural stimulating electrode (SCS), other inpatient pain therapies followed using anasthesiological, balneophysical and psychological techniques, as well as medications. The interdisciplinary discussion, including all the various diagnostical findings and the results of the therapeutical efforts, lead to the decision by conference participants to use the new electrophysical and imaging diagnostics. This lead to the discovery of a leiomyosarcoma, which had surrounded the N. obtoratius. After the removal surgery, the pain was gone and the pain medications being used could gradually be dropped.