Chronic Pain Management Specialists Deal With Pain’s Complexities

In practice for more than two decades, Dr. Todd Koppel treats patients for various kinds of pain at Garden State Pain Management in Clifton, New Jersey. As a chronic pain management specialist, Dr. Todd Koppel has earned board certification in that field.

Understanding of pain in the medical field has grown significantly. Pain is now viewed on a spectrum of disorders, and different pain conditions, whether acute or chronic pain, or cancer and non malignant pain, may have degrees of each. Pain conditions may be due to repetitive or acute injury, bone or soft tissue degeneration, or system disorders such as osteoporosis. Conditions can be complex or difficult to diagnose, and a many pain conditions have causes with are intricate and not obvious, even to experienced physicians. 

Specialists must know how and when to use various diagnostic procedures, evaluate complex problems, understand the physiology of pain, and suggest appropriate treatment. They are also required to communicate with physical therapists, psychologists and rehabilitative professionals.

The path to becoming a pain management specialist requires several levels of training. After medical school, a doctors must complete an internship, and residency. These residencies may include training in anesthesiology, rehabilitation, neurology, and physical medicine. Lastly, subspecialty fellowship training in interventional pain management is the final step in medical education to becoming a pain management specialist.

Specialists must then earn a general board certification in their chosen field, whether anesthesiology, psychiatry, and physical medicine or rehabilitation. Thereafter, the doctor is eligible to sit for the examination to become board certified in the subspecialty of pain management.