Pain is normal following any type of surgical procedure and should improve over time. But you need good pain control to heal.
At LiveWell Pain Management in Elmwood Park, New Jersey, our highly skilled physical medicine and interventional pain management physician, Dr. Nora Taha, understands the importance of pain control when it comes to health and healing.
Here, we talk about pain after surgery, what to expect, and when to reach out for help.
With advances in surgical tools and techniques, surgeons can perform complex procedures through smaller incisions, causing less overall body damage. However, surgery of any kind still causes tissue damage that results in pain.
It’s normal to experience pain following surgery. The type and severity of your pain depend on the complexity of your procedure. Minor surgery may cause mild pain that improves within days, while major open surgery can cause severe pain that takes weeks to improve.
Though everyone’s postsurgical experience differs, your surgeon should explain what you can expect following your procedure so you can properly prepare.
No matter what type of surgery you have, good pain control is an important part of your postsurgical treatment plan. Pain is normal, but it can delay recovery when not well-controlled.
Good pain control keeps you comfortable, allowing you to participate in activities that promote healing and prevent complications, like breathing exercises to prevent pneumonia and walking to reduce your risk of blood clots.
Pain management following your surgery may include medication, heat or cold therapy, and activity. Instinctually, you don’t want to move when your body is in pain, but movement is vital to the healing process.
To manage the discomfort from your surgery, it’s important that you take your pain medication as prescribed.
If your pain isn’t well-controlled following surgery, you’re at risk of persistent postoperative pain. This is a chronic pain condition that lasts two or more months and causes a different type of pain in a different location than the pain you had before surgery.
Persistent postoperative pain occurs because of inflammation and nerve injury from the surgical procedure, increasing pain signaling and sensitivity that lasts long after your surgical wound heals.
Good pain control following surgery may prevent the changes in pain sensitivity and signaling that leads to chronic discomfort. We create a postsurgical pain management plan that helps you heal faster and better.
Unfortunately, surgery may not provide the pain relief you anticipated. It’s not unusual to continue to have back pain following back surgery, a condition called failed back surgery syndrome (FBSS).
We offer spinal cord and dorsal root ganglion stimulation for FBSS. These procedures deliver a mild electrical current that alters the pain signal, decreasing your discomfort.
We also perform COOLIEF* radiofrequency ablation for persistent knee pain, shoulder pain, and hip pain following joint replacement surgery. This minimally invasive procedure deactivates the sensory nerves transmitting the pain signals so you get long-term relief.
If you just had surgery and still have pain, we can help. Call our office today or request an appointment online to set up a consultation with Dr. Taha.
