You feel pain in your brain as much as in your body, due to the way nerve signals from around your body register as sensation.
For some chronic pain patients, nerve signals around pain continue to fire even when there’s no need or cause, resulting in mysterious pain symptoms that aren’t easily soothed.
At Alpenglow Pain & Wellness of Anchorage, Alaska, interventional pain management physician and board-certified anesthesiologist Dr. Nichelle Renk and board-certified anesthesiologist Dr. Mary Beth Calor work with you to find pain management solutions that prove effective for you.
We understand how difficult it is to live your life haunted by chronic pain symptoms. One of the tools we use to improve quality of life for pain patients is radiofrequency (RF) ablation treatment with the COOLIEF® system, as well as traditional RF ablation.
Could cooled or traditional RF ablation help you? Here are just a few of the benefits of the procedure that you should know about.
RF ablation and cooled RF ablation have been shown in studies to be highly successful for long-term pain relief in both men and women.
It’s an effective treatment option for people living with chronic pain, post-injury pain, and degenerative conditions like arthritis, as well as complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) and other nerve conditions.
With RF ablation, you don’t have to go under the knife or rely on potentially addictive medications for effective pain relief.
Instead, this treatment option uses heat energy derived from an electric current to destroy the endings of targeted nerves, disrupting pain signals to the brain.
You need to rest for about a day after your RF ablation procedure, but you can get right back to daily activities after that.
This method for resolving your pain symptoms doesn’t come with onerous elements like overnight hospital stays or general anesthesia. We conduct your procedure in-office at Alpenglow Pain & Wellness, using local anesthesia and sedation as desired to help you rest in comfort while we work.
We position you on your stomach on top of an X-ray table during the procedure. Dr. Renk uses live video X-ray footage to guide her as she touches an insulated needle to target painful nerves. With careful targeting, only the desired nerves are affected in RF ablation treatment.
If your treatment plan calls for the COOLIEF cooled RF system, cool water circulates through the device at the same time that it delivers heat energy to stun targeted nerves.
You can expect to see the best results within a week or two of treatment, and your pain relief can last for six months or even a year or more. Alpenglow Pain & Wellness is one of only two providers in Alaska that offers both traditional and cooled RF treatments.
To learn more about how this treatment option could benefit you, contact Dr. Renk and the Alpenglow Pain & Wellness team online or by phone today and schedule your initial consultation with our pain relief experts.
