How Specialists Can Help You Tackle Your Chronic Pain

Most patients in chronic pain go to primary care providers—general practitioners, nurse practitioners, and physician's assistants. The problem is that too many of them stay there. In the past two decades, pain management has emerged as a distinct field, with its own physician, the pain specialist, but a 2005 study showed that less than 5% of chronic pain sufferers ever see one.

Pain specialists come from many fields, have extra training in pain management, and are certified in pain management from a specific specialty board or the American Board of Pain Medicine. So that means you could see an anesthesiologist, a neurosurgeon, a physiatrist, a neurologist, an orthopedic surgeon or even a psychiatrist who is also a pain specialist.