Pain Management
Our Goal in Vallejo Pain Management
Our goal in the Vallejo Pain Management Department is to help you. If you have had chronic pain for a long time you may have had some frustrating or disappointing interactions with the medical system.
We can help you:
1) Negotiate the Kaiser system efficiently to get the pain related services you need.
2) Adjust your medication regimen so that it is safer and works better to control your pains.
3) Improve your skill with the non-pill things you can do to lower your pain levels.
The pain doctor will meet with you to make an overall pain management plan. Unfortunately, no combination of pills can completely eliminate chronic pain. Most pill based regimens lower pains about 30%. This can make a big difference in your quality of life.
Recently, doctors have learned a lot more about the dangers of taking opioids long term for chronic pain. Risks of chronic opioid therapy include: physical dependence, tolerance, addiction, hyperalgesia, sedation, impaired judgment or coordination, respiratory depression, sleep disturbance, mood disturbance, hormonal imbalance, immunosuppression, and death. More and more patients are finding that once they taper down or stop their daily opioids their health improves.
If you want help with the other 70% of your pains then you will want to attend our pain-lowering skill trainings. In these trainings, you will learn the non-pill ways to control or lower your pains. There are no fees or co-pays associated with these trainings.
The Overview
is a one-time 60 minute training. It gives you an overview of the services we provide in the department. It also gives an introduction to the neurologic basis of chronic pain and reviews important medication side effects and risks you should be aware of. Everyone who enters our program need to attend this training. At the end of the training you will be booked for all of the follow up appointments that you need.
The Pain-Lowering Skills Training Program
gives information about your body, pain, and how pain-lowering skills work. More importantly, it teaches you pain-lowering skills everyone with chronic pain needs to know to decrease their pains. Whether your pains are more form your bones, joints, muscles, or nerves, you will learn both how to prevent pain flares and how to calm down your pains when they are too high. In these trainings, you will learn skills in pacing, body mechanics, fitness, relaxation, stress reduction, and mindfulness. You will need to practice these skills at home to get the full benefit that they can offer you.
After some introductory trainings to learn the many ways your brain and body interact to produce the pain experience, you will be eligible to join any of our ongoing weekly drop-in group trainings. Members usually participate in these trainings regularly for three to nine months–depending on how quickly you learn the material and use the skills at home. The pain-lowering skills work when you integrate them into your day to day life.
We look forward to meeting you and designing an individualized treatment plan to address your particular pain issues.
