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CC BY 4.0 · Surg J (N Y) 2021; 07(01): e1-e2
DOI: 10.1055/s-0040-1722176
Case Report

Pain Alleviation and Opioid Weaning in an 80-Year-Old with Chronic Foot Pain Following Injection Therapy with Perineural Dexmedetomidine and Dexamethasone

Amnon A. Berger 
1   Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
,
Ivan Urits 
1   Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
,
Jamal Hasoon 
1   Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
,
Alan D. Kaye
2   Department of Anesthesiology, Louisiana State University Health Shreveport, Shreveport, Louisiana
,
Omar Viswanath 
3   Valley Anesthesiology and Pain Consultants – Envision Physician Services, Phoenix, Arizona
4   Department of Anesthesiology, University of Arizona College of Medicine - Phoenix, Phoenix, Arizona
5   Department of Anesthesiology, Creighton University School of Medicine, Omaha, Nebraska
,
Jonathan Eskander
6   Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, Portsmouth Anesthesia Associates, Portsmouth, Virginia
› Author Affiliations Funding No external funding source was used for this publication.
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Abstract

Opiates are routinely used for chronic pain patients, and up to 44% of them will have a prescription for an opiate medication for pain alleviation. However, of the 76 million adults prescribed opiates for pain management, about 12% report misuse, and a large number of these may find themselves addicted to opioid medications. Opioid addiction is an ongoing epidemic, costing many lives. Withdrawal is very difficult. This requires providers to consider alternative analgesic plans and minimize opiate use. Here we report the use of a dexamethasone-dexmedetomidine combination for a regional nerve block in an elderly woman chronically treated with opiate medications who had previously failed opiate weaning. Following her nerve block, she was able to completely wean off of opioids and continues having good pain control with an opioid-free regimen.

Keywords

pain therapy - chronic pain - opioid withdrawal - Dex-Dex

Disclosures

The authors have nothing to disclose.




Publication History

Received: 24 March 2020

Accepted: 22 September 2020

Article published online:
07 January 2021

© 2021. The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, permitting unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction so long as the original work is properly cited. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

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