Hoag Pioneers Holistic Approach to Pain Management
Hoag’s dedication to comprehensive, integrated medicine uncovered a pain point. Specifically, pain.
“In most hospital systems, nobody owns pain,” said Charles De Mesa, D.O., M.P.H., who recently joined Hoag and is double board certified in physician medicine and rehabilitation and in pain medicine by the American Board of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. “You might experience chest pain, see a cardiologist and get a clean bill of health. But what happens if you still have pain? Those situations become challenging for health systems to manage.”
Hoag is taking an innovative approach to meet those challenges through the Chronic Pain & Neuropathy Program within the Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute. This evolving program is designed to address such chronic pain issues as back pain, headaches, cancer pain, orofacial pain and more with a comprehensive and holistic approach.
That approach requires a deep understanding of pain management – another way Hoag stands apart. The program aims to bring together pain specialists from a broad spectrum of disciplines, each of whom contributes to a complete picture of the patient’s health.
Underscoring the cross-specialty approach Hoag is taking to pain, Dr. De Mesa serves as both director of Chronic Pain & Neuropathy Program within the Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute, as well as chief of interventional pain, physical medicine & rehabilitation at the Hoag Spine Center. Dr. De Mesa is excited to work with Hoag’s expert teams to advance a modern approach to pain management that relies less on surgery or opioids.
“Effective pain management starts with an accurate diagnosis, followed by a multidisciplinary approach that includes the proper experts, including those with subspecialty board certification in pain medicine,” said Michael Brant-Zawadzki, M.D., the Ron and Sandi Simon Executive Medical Director Endowed Chair of the Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute and Hoag’s senior physician executive. “Hoag’s program focuses on the whole person and on compassionate care, with management of medication dependency issues, support from physical therapy, non-traditional tools such as virtual reality pain modification, mindfulness acupuncture, and massage therapy are coordinated through the program.”
Between 20 and 40% of Americans suffer from chronic pain. Neuropathic, or nerve pain, affects more than 10% of the U.S. population. And these rates are expected to rise due to an aging population, as well as an increase in diabetes.
By offering dedicated pain care across all institutes and specialties, Hoag is pioneering a new approach to pain management that will address pain efficiently and effectively.
“Hoag is uniquely poised to offer this approach as we work towards advancing pain management due to our expert diagnostic capabilities and technologies, as well as the ability to conduct investigational research in neuromodulation and even regenerative medicine,” Dr. De Mesa said. “Hoag’s dedication to research, clinical trials and patient-centric care provides patients with meaningful pain management that is not reliant on narcotics or other medications that are deleterious to their health.”
The result will be a holistic approach to treating patients with an emphasis on wellness. Dr. De Mesa, who will primarily work within Hoag Spine Center, emphasized this point by highlighting the example of back pain: “We integrate care with conservative measures, such as acupuncture and cognitive behavioral therapy. If those don’t help the patient, we move to non-invasive interventions such as injections or minimally invasive spine procedures.”
The goal is to expand Hoag’s commitment to comprehensive management and continuity of care for patients contending with pain.
“People are looking to achieve wellness,” Dr. De Mesa said. “There are people who are frustrated and living in discomfort. They have not found a home for their chronic pain condition. Our philosophy is to honor what they are seeking through evidence-based medicine and emerging therapies for pain.”
