Abstract
INTRODUCTION: The peripheral nervous system is an increasingly popular target for chronic pain treatment modalities. Noninvasive neuromodulation has shown promise at providing significant chronic pain relief with a much safer side effect profile. This retrospective pilot study is shaped around a noninvasive neuromodulation system over a 2-week treatment timeline. METHODS: Open-label survey of chronic pain patients recruited from Veteran Affairs, orthopedic, and pain health systems. If a noninvasive neuromodulation system was prescribed the patients were then offered a 2-week follow-up survey. This voluntary survey did not affect their therapy duration or quality. This survey was designed to address similar metrics as smaller noninvasive neuromodulation studies to allow a quality comparison while giving more power with a large population size of 1511 patients. Overall pain scores (including before and after scores), satisfaction level, desire to continue therapy, medication use, effect on functional metrics (mood, sleep, sit, stand, walk, and lift), and activities of daily living (ADL) scores were assessed. RESULTS: The results demonstrated an overall pain reduction of 46%. All functional metrics were improved throughout with the largest improvements reported in mood and sleep at over 47%. Medication use was reported as decreased or eliminated in 42% of patients. There were no adverse reactions or complications reported over the 1511 patients. CONCLUSION: This survey is amongst the largest population sizes every studied for noninvasive neuromodulation. Within just 2 weeks patients can see a reduction in overall pain and medication needs. Although survey studies have inherent limitations such as duration and compliance biases with such an overwhelming benefit in every category we believe that noninvasive neuromodulation therapy is a promising, safe, and cost-effective therapy. Future studies should focus on long-term follow-ups and post-therapy pain scores with a placebo group.