

The use of opiod medication, a subject rife with controversy, took
center stage when the Pain and Palliative Care Group (PPCG), an
OU-COM organization open to any Southeastern Ohio health care
provider who has an interest in complex pain management issues, held
its second annual seminar.
Held in September as part of Ohio’s Pain Awareness
Month, the seminar addressed such topics as pain pathways, the
relationship between health care providers and the criminal justice
system, and the roll-out of new clinical tool—the Rational Opioid
Use Tool—that guides clinicians through the process of assessing and
scoring pain to help determine treatment decisions.
“We’re really just looking at increasing
practitioners’ comfort in prescribing medication for non-malignant
pain,” says Tracy Marx, D.O., assistant professor
of family medicine and associate chair of the Department of Family
Medicine, who along with Sarah McGrew, B.S.N.,
adjunct faculty instructor in the Department of Social Medicine,
organized the seminar.
“It’s so important to individually assess
patients,” McGrew adds. “This tool is an effective and cost
efficient method that allows clinicians to make an informed decision
about the use of opioids when treating patients with chronic pain.”
Another tool available to physicians is Ohio’s
Automated Prescription Monitoring Program, “a godsend for
practitioners,” Marx notes. The program allows doctors to view their
patients’ prescription records and search for possible medication
abuse.
But prescription pain medications aren’t the only
answer for chronic pain. McGrew and Marx champion physical activity
to combat a vicious cycle of disease, resultant loss of function,
fatigue and emotions like anxiety, frustration, guilt and
depression.
“It’s counterintuitive. Most people don’t realize
that exercise helps pain,” says McGrew, who lectures osteopathic
medical students on non-drug pain management techniques. These
include osteopathic manipulation, massage therapy, physical therapy,
heat and cold treatment, acupuncture, biofeedback and other
complementary alternatives to prescription pain medications. She
also arranges for arthritis patients to share their experiences with
fi rst-year students.
“Pain affects everyone regardless of socioeconomic
status, educational level, and disease,” Marx says. “It doesn’t fit
nicely into a specialty, so it’s something that falls through the
cracks a lot.”
When Marx was a medical student at OU-COM,
information about addiction, pain or palliative care wasn’t part of
the curriculum. She says the addition of these to the curriculum,
which is taught during an intensive two-week session, ranks OU-COM
among the top medical schools in Ohio for pain management education.
|