When Precision Meets Relief
However, efficacy varies significantly depending on the condition. For central spinal stenosis, injections often provide only short-term relief—reducing disability for a few months but rarely altering the long-term trajectory.
The Therapeutic Window: A Bridge, Not a Destination
Think of it this way: the injection does not fix the problem; it opens a door. What happens next—the movement, the strengthening, the retraining of the nervous system—determines whether that door leads somewhere lasting.
The Anodunos Approach: Seeing the Person, Not Just the Pain
The traditional biomedical view often overlooks the biopsychosocial factors that perpetuate suffering: chronic stress, poor sleep, nutritional deficiencies, and a nervous system stuck in a constant state of alarm. A procedure might quiet a nerve, but it cannot heal a life disrupted by pain.
That is why we are educating providers and advocating for policy changes to support truly transdisciplinary care. Rather than a fragmented approach—where a patient sees a doctor for an injection one day and a therapist on another, often without communication between them—we champion the role of trained Pain Navigators who build collaborative care teams. These teams ensure that interventional treatments are supported by restorative therapies, nutritional guidance, and behavioral health strategies working in concert.
Interventional Pain Medicine is a vital instrument, but it is just one instrument in the orchestra. To truly move toward a world “without pain”—the Greek meaning of Anodunos—we must treat the whole person, not just the pain generator.
When the diagnosis is precise, the results can be life changing. Transforaminal epidural steroid injections, for example, have demonstrated success rates as high as 84% for acute radicular pain (sciatica) at 1.4 years, often sparing patients from surgery. Similarly, newer innovations like Basivertebral Nerve Ablation for vertebrogenic low back pain show sustained relief in 66% of patients at the five-year mark.
However, efficacy varies significantly depending on the condition. For central spinal stenosis, injections often provide only short-term relief—reducing disability for a few months but rarely altering the long-term trajectory.
The Therapeutic Window: A Bridge, Not a Destination
This variability highlights a crucial reality: IPM procedures rarely work in isolation. Their greatest value often lies in creating what clinicians call a “therapeutic window”—a period of reduced pain that allows patients to engage in physical therapy and rehabilitation that would otherwise be too painful to attempt.
Think of it this way: the injection does not fix the problem; it opens a door. What happens next—the movement, the strengthening, the retraining of the nervous system—determines whether that door leads somewhere lasting.
The Anodunos Approach: Seeing the Person, Not Just the Pain
At Anodunos, we believe that treating chronic pain requires more than addressing a biological signal. While we recognize the value of interventional procedures when used judiciously, we advocate for a more comprehensive model—one that sees the whole person.
The traditional biomedical view often overlooks the biopsychosocial factors that perpetuate suffering: chronic stress, poor sleep, nutritional deficiencies, and a nervous system stuck in a constant state of alarm. A procedure might quiet a nerve, but it cannot heal a life disrupted by pain.
That is why we are educating providers and advocating for policy changes to support truly transdisciplinary care. Rather than a fragmented approach—where a patient sees a doctor for an injection one day and a therapist on another, often without communication between them—we champion the role of trained Pain Navigators who build collaborative care teams. These teams ensure that interventional treatments are supported by restorative therapies, nutritional guidance, and behavioral health strategies working in concert.
Interventional Pain Medicine is a vital instrument, but it is just one instrument in the orchestra. To truly move toward a world “without pain”—the Greek meaning of Anodunos—we must treat the whole person, not just the pain generator.
The Anodunos Method
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