CME: Therapeutic Updates, Best Practices, and Barriers to Care in the Treatment of Chronic Pain

ACCREDITATION EXPIRED: January 08, 2015

Activity Description / Statement of Need:

Chronic pain is a serious medical condition found in a diverse range of patient populations.  Because of the etiologically heterogeneous nature of this condition, many treatment modalities exist, some of which apply to a broader range of patient populations than do others.  For several reasons that are both patient- and provider-specific and include concern over medication dependence, stigma to narcotic use, and the inherent difficulty in measuring the subjective phenomenon of pain itself, chronic pain is frequently undertreated.

Opioids are a mainstay of pharmacologic care for non-neuropathic chronic pain and are available in many dosage forms with novel routes of administration, adding a layer of complexity to their prescription.  There are also many products combining opioids with other medications providing an additional set of therapeutic options.  These dual products may either contain synergistic combinations of medications for added efficacy or agonist-antagonist combinations meant to reduce abuse potential or side effects.

Healthcare professionals must navigate an array of regulations specifically aimed at the prescription of controlled substances when managing chronic pain, and the uninformed may skirt or traverse the law, whether intentionally or not, when they prescribe analgesics. 

Because extended-release medications are the most likely to be abused due to increased potency, additional education should be provided and caution used when prescribing them.  The FDA is seeking ways to make these medications safer but, in the mean time, stronger caution may be needed on the part of prescribers. 

The literature suggests that: there are or may be emerging or existing patterns of racial and ethnic disparities in healthcare and treatment of patients with chronic pain; race- and ethnicity-based discrimination within the healthcare environment are associated with disparities in care; and that such discrimination is associated with both worse chronic health condition control and a higher incidence catastrophic health events.

Taken in aggregate, these factors suggest that a gap exists between best practices and actual medical practice; they also highlight the importance of considering alternatives to opioid therapy when appropriate.  This program has been designed to bring healthcare professionals’ knowledge of the strategies for management of chronic pain up to date.  The program also attempts to examine the role of demographic-based barriers to care of patients with chronic pain and strategies to minimize or alleviate those disparities.

Agenda

• Introduction, Disclosures
• Epidemiology of chronic pain
• Clinical features of chronic pain Treatment of chronic pain
• Barriers to optimal care in patients with chronic pain
• Summary, conclusions, and best practice recap

Target Audience:

Healthcare professionals specializing in anesthesiology, dentistry, emergency medicine, family medicine, internal medicine, neurology, oncology, pain management, palliative care, primary care, psychiatry, public health, surgery, or those who otherwise commonly care for patients with chronic pain or who frequently encounter individuals with substance abuse disorders in practice.

Commercial Support Disclosure: This program is supported by  educational grants from Purdue Pharma L. P.

Release Date: January 08, 2013 -- Expiration Date: January 08, 2015

Faculty: Chris Herndon, PharmD

Agenda

Learning Objectives

Accreditation

Faculty Disclosure and Resolution of COI

Instructions

System Requirements