WELLNESS
Advancements in Pain Managment Local doctors leverage new technology for chronic pain.
BEFORE THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC,
telemedicine programs were not a common offering to patients seeking care. But the pandemic forced healthcare providers to adjust care and deliver treatment remotely through telemedicine programs. Now, almost all healthcare providers have programs in place, but not all providers have evolved as far as Twin Cities Pain Clinic in Edina has in providing its patients with real-time virtual medicine. The clinic, which specializes in local pain management, is the first healthcare organization in the state to advance to the next level of virtual care when it completed its first appointment with
implanted stimulators using Abbotts’ NeuroSphere Virtual Care platform this past April. According to Andrew Will MD, the company founder and medical director of Twin Cities Pain Clinic, this technology allows a patient to both communicate with a physician and remotely receive stimulation settings in real-time, from any location. According to the website, this device is called a spinal cord stimulator and it relieves pain by stimulating nerves in the spine. “We can actually make real-time adjustments and ask [patients] how they’re feeling virtually,” Will says. He explains the spinal cord stimulator as a battery-powered device that’s BY SAMANTHA DELEON
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placed beneath the skin with thin insulted wires that are introduced to the backside of the spinal cord. The patient has a remote control that they can use to turn it on or off to adjust. “[The battery] delivers small amounts of electricity to the spinal cord, which intercepts the pain signal that is trying to go up to the brain,” Will says, “So much of the pain that we treat is chronic pain that the patient doesn’t want or need to know.” By delivering this electric stimulation, over 80 percent of the pain can be blocked for 24 hours a day, according to Will. Will says the stimulator can be placed either in the lower back to block out
