We are pleased to report that the Section on Pain has become Joint with the Congress of Neurological (CNS). This action adds momentum to our goal of working to increase the role of pain medicine in academic and private neurosurgical practices.
With the Section’s change in status, pain medicine was well represented at the CNS Annual Meeting in San Francisco. We offered a full-day practical course, two luncheon seminars and a Pain Section program highlighted by a symposium on roles of pain medicine and neurosurgery.
AANS Annual Meeting
Pain treatment educational opportunities at the 1996 AANS Annual Meeting in Minneapolis will include three practical courses, two breakfast seminars, and the Section program featuring a symposium entitled “Persistent Pain after Spinal Surgery-What Do I Do Now?” The presentation will focus on causes, incidence, and the risks and benefits of medical treatment, both narcotic and non-narcotic, of the problem.
Section Satellite Meeting
The Pain Section is excited about its sponsorship of a special two-day satellite meeting on interventional pain procedures for neurosurgeons to be held immediately before the 1996 Congress meeting in Montreal. This will be a didactic and hands-on workshop covering both ablative and augmentative pain management techniques for general neurosurgery. Faculty will include 20 North American and European leaders in neurosurgical pain medicine.
NEUROSURGERY://ON-CALL®
The Section is actively working with Richard Toselli, MD, editor of the NEUROSURGERY://ON-CALL® project as a means to provide information and mutual communications relating to pain management. In the next six months, the Section will examine how to best use the AANS/CNS home page on the Internet to provide information and mutual communi-cation relating to pain management. We also hope to establish a system of e-mail communication between members of the Pain Section as well as between any neurosurgeon and Section subspecialists for patient, reimbursement, or topic-related questions.
Certification Issues
The Section continues to analyze the need for support of the American Board of Pain Medicine (ABPM) and to track the progress of its recognition by the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS). It appears that the ABPM will not affect the ability of practicing neurosurgeons to perform various pain procedures. It does, however, provide much-needed guidelines and standards for physicians devoting the majority of their interest to pain manage-ment. To achieve standardization in this area, ABPM needs the support of organized neurosurgery, anesthesiology, psychiatry, and rehabilitation. Kim Burchiel, MD, Phil Lippe, MD, and others from the Section are working to accomplish this goal.
Educational Guidelines and Outcome Measures
The Section is working with a task force from the American Academy of Pain Medicine (AAPM) to create a core curricula for pain medicine in resident education. The Section is also responding to the growing interest in treatment outcome assessments by working in collaboration with the AAPM to determine appropriate outcome measures and to initiate actual outcome studies for pain management procedures.
CPT Coding
Work by Richard Penn, MD, Robert Florin, MD, and others with the Nomenclature Committee and the RVU Update Committee (RUC) of the AMA and HCFA to update CPT codes and RVW values have resulted in new, 1996 CPT coding options for pain procedures.
New Section Exhibit
Jeffrey Brown, MD, with assistance from Radionics Inc. and Medtronic Inc., has coordinated a new Pain Section exhibit which was unveiled at the CNS Annual Meeting in October.
If there are any questions or comments, please feel free to contact either myself, Sam Hassenbusch, MD, at:
e-mail: [email protected]
fax: 713-794-4950
or Kim Burchiel, MD, at:
e-mail: [email protected]
fax: 503-494-7161.
Member input is welcomed and encouraged.