Florence Chaverneff, PhD

Burden and progression of coronary atherosclerosis was found to be worsened in non-obese patients with rheumatoid arthritis and low vs high LDL levels.

Treating osteoarthritis in older patients with tramadol vs nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs may be associated with an increased mortality rate during the year following treatment initiation.

A “Pain and Stress Management” program for the management of chronic pain, was found to be effective in alleviating pain, diminishing stress, promoting self-management of pain, and ameliorating general well-being.

Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation administered during physical activity may effectively alleviate fibromyalgia-associated pain, fatigue, and disease impact in women.

Treatment of active Takayasu arteritis with infliximab may result in remission or in a diminished requirement for glucocorticoids.

Zoledronic acid did not significantly reduce knee pain or bone marrow lesion size overall in patients with knee osteoarthritis over 24 months.

Tofacitinib may provide a fast and prolonged analgesic effect in patients with rheumatoid arthritis or psoriatic arthritis who are unresponsive to csDMARD or to TNFi, as well as in individuals with ankylosing spondylitis.

April 28, 2018 is National Prescription Drug Take Back Day.

Several circulating biomarkers for antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody-associated vasculitis disease activity and organ involvement were identified using targeted serum proteomics.

Discontinuing denosumab therapy in osteoporosis may increase the risk for vertebral fractures.

Common rheumatoid arthritis drugs methotrexate and biologics, but not prednisolone, may increase the risk for herpes zoster.

Muscle magnetic resonance imaging may complement a physician’s objective assessment in juvenile dermatomyositis, although negative MRI findings should not preclude treatment continuation.

Transcranial random noise stimulation improved both physical and cognitive symptoms in fibromyalgia.

Anthony Mariano, PhD, gives insight into dealing with patients’ demands for opioids.

An interview with Penney Cowan, founder and chief executive officer of the American Chronic Pain Association, where she discusses the ACPA’s publication aimed at helping healthcare practitioners improve care of patients with chronic pain.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine has released a report on cannabis and cannabinoids, outlining current knowledge and giving recommendations for future research.

Identifiable, distinct phases exist during the process of pain development after destabilization of the medial meniscus.

Drug development faces 2 major issues: pre-clinical animal efficacy studies do not accurately predict human efficacy, and clinical trials often wrongly fail to show drug efficacy.

Knee OA was associated with cortical thinning in brain regions not typically associated with pain processing.

Concern was expressed by some pain specialists over the new CDC guidelines addressing the opioid epidemic.

Preliminary results suggest that transdermal analgesic is efficacious in reducing both opioid use and pain scores.

Jeffrey Gudin, MD, recommends a “stepwise approach” to designing a treatment plan for patients with chronic pain.

Pain catastrophizing was significantly reduced by this simple 2-hour psycho-educational class.

Several imminent pain pharmacotherapy patent expirations are forecasted to affect the pain management landscape.

The model proposes that prioritizing alternate life goals with optimism rather than perpetuating pain-associated behaviors with negative affect can break the pain cycle.

Among older adults, immune system dysregulation may contribute to the increased prevalence of pain in older adults

This study should help identify CSM patients at higher risks of developing perioperative complications, and to anticipate these by taking preventive measures, and closely monitoring patients

Investigators hypothesized that fibroblast-like synoviocytes, which line joints had variable epigenetic patterns, underlying variations in joint inflammation and response to treatment.

Stem cells isolated from bone marrow have been shown to efficiently support repair of injured ligaments and tendons and adipose stem cells have some benefits for cartilage repair.

Therapeutic anti-TNF antibodies, long thought to act primarily via blockade of proinflammatory soluble TNF, appear to also bind membrane-bound TNF supporting regulatory T-cell expansion suppressing further inflammation.