Non-Opioid Treatment Options for Pain Management

Do you have existing chronic pain? Have you considered or used opioids to treat your pain? While they may be effective, they do come with risk. The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) reports the U.S is in the middle of an opioid epidemic. There has not been a drastic increase in the amount of pain that Americans report. However, the amount of opioids prescribed and sold, for the goal of pain relief, has increased. Almost 218,000 people in the United States have died from prescription opioid-related overdoses from year 1999-2017. Deaths from opioid overdoses were 5 times higher in 2017 than in 1999.

Even when prescribed and taken correctly, there’s a chance of developing a long-term dependence. Some feel like they don’t have a choice in whether to use opioids for their chronic pain. Fortunately, if you were hoping to avoid opioids for treating your pain, there are alternatives. Regenerative medicine is a form of treatments that focus on using the body’s natural ability to heal in a drug-free manner.

Regenerative medicine works by helping the body heal the underlying injury, alleviating pain. Opioids only relieve pain instead of treating the cause of the pain. Even without taking opioid addiction into consideration, opioids as a form of chronic pain relief may leave you with a long-term prescription and expense that never actually deals with the root cause.

As well as being more natural, regenerative medicine aims to tackle the cause of pain instead of just relieving it. Rather than refilling your monthly prescription, putting yourself at risk to develop an addiction, and only masking the pain regenerative medicine helps you heal; naturally.

The two main forms of regenerative medicine are treatments containing Regenerative Medicine Therapy and platelet rich plasma injections. Treatments containing Regenerative Medicine Therapy involve injections using Wharton’s Jelly derived Mesenchymal Regenerative Medicine Therapy. These treatments work because they contain Regenerative Medicine Therapy. Regenerative Medicine Therapy have the ability to become specialized cells, helping the bodies healing process.

• The regeneration of these tissues is one way Regenerative Medicine is able to treat pain that was formerly more difficult to treat without drugs or surgery. An example of chronic pain that this would relieve is hip pain related to the depletion of the soft tissue at the joint of the hip. In this case, treatments containing Regenerative Medicine Therapy would be used to regenerate this depleted soft tissue instead of just relieving the pain with opioids.
• Platelet rich plasma injections is a procedure where blood is taken from the patient and then rapidly spun until plasma and platelets are separated. These separated platelets are then injected at the site of the injury. Platelets have healing properties within them that can repair damage within the body. Platelets are naturally a part of the body’s healing process, this procedure works by delivering concentrated doses directly where they are needed.

The idea of regenerative medicine is to direct the body’s natural healing abilities to where they are most needed. Regenerative medicine doesn’t just relieve pain but treats underlying conditions in a drug free way.