Chronic pain represents one of the most important public health problems in terms of both the number of patients afflicted and health care costs. Most patients with chronic pain are treated with medications as the mainstay of therapy, and yet most medically treated patients continue to report ongoing pain. Additionally, adverse effects from pain medications represent a major challenge for clinicians and patients. Spinal cord stimulation and intrathecal drug delivery systems are well-established techniques that have been utilized for over 25 years.
To synthesize the evidence regarding the effect of spinal stimulation (SS) vs medical therapy (MT) and the effect of newer SS technologies vs conventional SS on pain reduction in patients with intractable spine or limb pain.