Dr. Edward Rubin discusses the unseen value of mid-level providers, such as nurse practitioners (NP) and physician assistants (PA). They are valuable in pain medicine due to their skillset and vital relationships with the patients. For instance, they can help increase medication compliance, handle difficult cases, and implement psychological screening tools. Dr. Rubin explains how PAs and NPs are a meaningful part of the pain management process.

Dr. Stogicza describes in great detail, the reemergence of prolotherapy, and why its efficacy is becoming more recognized in treating pain. She describes prolotherapy as “absolutely the opposite of every standard technique.” She explains how it is categorized as regenerative therapy, and gives an example of how prolotherapy is used to treat the root cause of cervicogenic headaches by allowing the body to heal the ligamentous (soft tissue) damage that can refer pain to cause such headaches.

Dr. David Rosenblum discusses his approach in treating cervical radiculopathy via extraforaminal block on the suprascapular nerve while the patient is sitting. This unique approach, as he explains, is much safer than a transforaminal and even an interlaminar injection and has shown great results. He concludes with a brief overview of his use of stem cell injections, PRP, for specific patients.