AHN Pain Management Division

Pain management procedures

Because pain can happen anywhere in your body and is caused by a variety of injuries and medical conditions, there are many options for pain relief. Our experts use a variety of techniques, including medications, therapies, and minor procedures to help you get back to living with little to no pain.

Pain management injections

Injections are a common procedure to help manage pain because they can deliver medication directly to where your pain is. For many of these procedures, we use ultrasound technology to guide needle placement. Injection procedures we offer include:

Epidural

This procedure injects medication into the area surrounding your spinal cord, also known as the epidural space, to relieve pain. An epidural steroid injection is a mixture of a corticosteroid (an anti-inflammatory medication) and an anesthetic (a numbing agent) going into the epidural space, which is the area surrounding the spinal cord and nerve roots. The medication works to reduce swelling and inflammation around the nerves, providing pain relief that can last from weeks to months, often allowing patients to better participate in physical therapy and rehabilitation. In some cases, we use a blood patch, an injection of a small amount of your own blood into the epidural space to seal leaks in your spinal fluid after a spinal tap or epidural.

Selective nerve root block

We inject a local anesthetic and sometimes a steroid medication near a specific nerve root to diagnose or treat pain caused by irritation or compression.

Facet injection

This procedure injects a mixture of anesthetic and corticosteroid medication into your facet joints — small joints in the spine — to reduce pain and inflammation. Medical branch blocks numb the nerves that send pain signals from the facet joints, helping to diagnose the source of your pain and provide temporary relief. Intra-articular injections inject medication directly into a joint space, like your knee or hip, to help reduce pain and inflammation.

Sympathetic blocks

These blocks target your sympathetic nervous system, which controls involuntary bodily functions, to treat pain caused by it not working properly. We can target different areas of the body with sympathetic blocks. The names of these nerve blocks may seem strange or bring about questions, and your AHN care team can explain everything to you in detail, so you feel confident in your care plan:

• Stellate blocks inject medication near a nerve cluster in your neck to treat pain in your head, neck, chest, or arm.
• Celiac blocks target a network of nerves in your abdomen to relieve abdominal pain.
• Lumbar plexus blocks target nerves in the lower back to relieve pain in your lower back, legs, or feet.
• Hypogastric plexus blocks target a nerve network in the pelvis to manage chronic pelvic pain.
• Ganglion impar blocks target a nerve cluster at the base of your spine to relieve pain in your lower pelvic and groin region.

Peripheral nerve blocks

We inject medication near a specific peripheral nerve outside the brain and spinal cord to help relieve pain in different areas, including:

• Iliohypogastric or ilioinguinal nerve blocks for pain in your lower abdomen, groin, upper thigh, and hip area.
• Genitofemoral nerve blocks for pain in your upper thighs and genital region.
• Intercostal nerve blocks for pain in your chest or upper abdomen.
• Occipital nerve blocks for headaches and migraines.
• Pudendal nerve blocks for pain in your pelvic region.

Joint injections

These injections deliver medication directly into a joint, like your hip, knee, or shoulder, to help reduce pain and inflammation.

Bursa injections

A bursa is a fluid-filled sac that cushions joints. When it's inflamed, it can cause pain around your joints. We can inject a local anesthetic and anti-inflammatory medication directly into the bursa sac to help reduce inflammation and pain.

Trigger point injections

These injections target tight, painful knots in muscles, called trigger points, to relieve muscle pain.

Diagnosing the cause of your back pain

We can use discography or a discogram to diagnose the source of your back pain. With this procedure, we inject a contrast dye into the center of one or more spinal discs and look at any issues with X-rays or other imaging techniques.

Therapy for pain management

We offer behavioral health services for chronic pain that include:

• Cognitive behavioral therapy to help you learn specific behaviors and thought patterns that help you manage your pain.
• Trauma-informed care and group therapy options.
• Support from a licensed professional counselor and licensed clinical social worker.

Minimally invasive pain management procedures

These procedures are alternatives to traditional surgery, using smaller incisions and specialized tools to target your pain with less overall recovery time. We offer:

Radiofrequency ablation

This procedure uses heat generated by radio waves to destroy or shrink specific tissues in the body. This helps disrupt pain signals sent from medial branch nerves (cervical, thoracic, and lumbar) to your facet joints in the spine. It can also be used to damage the nerves responsible for pain signals in your bursa, providing long-lasting pain relief.

Neurostimulation

This procedure uses electrical impulses to change the activity of your nervous system and relieve pain. We typically implant a device that delivers these impulses to block or reduce pain signals in various areas, like the dorsal column, nerve clusters along your spinal cord, and lower back muscles.

Kyphoplasty

We use this procedure to treat spinal compression fractures. First, we insert a balloon into the fractured vertebra to create space, then fill the space with bone cement to stabilize the vertebra.

Minimally invasive lumbar decompression (MILD)

MILD is used to relieve lumbar spinal stenosis by restoring space in your spinal canal, ultimately reducing pressure on your nerves and relieving back and leg pain.

Other pain management procedures

We use intrathecal drug delivery to deliver medication directly into the fluid surrounding your brain and spinal cord to help with pain.

Pain management specialists

The AHN Pain Management team works together across multiple facilities to find the best solution for your acute or chronic pain. We specialize in the diagnosis, treatment, and management of acute and chronic pain using a wide variety of techniques, medications, therapies, and minimally invasive procedures.

Our team of pain management specialists includes:

How to get care

If you have acute or chronic pain, we’re here to help.

Schedule your appointment today

To schedule an appointment or learn more about services at the Pain Management Division, call 412-359-6200.

What to expect at your new patient visit

We recommend that you bring a trusted friend or family member to attend any appointment, but we do not recommend taking young children who cannot be left unattended in the waiting rooms. There are also certain items and paperwork you’ll want to have with you, so our office staff and healthcare team have your necessary information.

Required identification and payment

In order to process your information and start your appointment on time, please bring:

• Insurance cards
• Photo ID
• Copay (no cash accepted)

Medical information and records

Please bring copies of previous medical records, including office visit notes, lab work, hospital stay summaries, and radiology reports from outside health organizations. You’ll also want to have a complete list of medications and supplements, including dosing amounts.  For worker’s compensation or auto claim purposes, please have: date of injury, claim number, billing address, name and phone number of claims adjuster.

Imaging studies

If you have had imaging studies done at outside of Allegheny Health Network imaging locations, you will need to:

• Contact the imaging facility and request a physical disc with the imaging and radiologist report
• Some sites will require a few days to a week’s notice before you can pick up the disc
• If you do not have copies of imaging, your initial evaluation will be incomplete, and we may need to schedule additional appointments.  

Personal items and equipment

If you will require any personal items or medical equipment — walker, cane, wheelchair, oxygen — that will make your post-procedure care easier, please bring that with you. 

Refer your patient to AHN Pain Management

We conveniently offer eight locations throughout western Pennsylvania for pain medicine consultations and treatment. 

Refer your patient to AHN Neurosurgery

If you have a patient that you would like to refer to AHN Pain Management, call  412-359-6200.If you have any questions about independent physician referral, see our frequently asked questions and answers.

For more information about referring your patient to an AHN specialist, read the Independent Physician Referral FAQs.