Pain Medicine

Hangzhou Red Cross Hospital is one of the first hospitals in Zhejiang Province to establish an outpatient pain clinic and is the “Fifth Clinical Center of Chinese Pain.” Its founder, Director Zheng Hanguang, was among the earliest in China to perform celiac plexus block to treat visceral pain caused by pancreatic cancer. Currently, the Department of Pain has an independent inpatient ward, 5 full-time physicians, 2 physicians with senior professional titles, 2 physicians with doctoral degrees, and 5 physicians with master’s or higher degrees. The department mainly treats patients with trigeminal neuralgia, cervicogenic headache, postherpetic neuralgia, neck, shoulder, back, and leg pain, as well as patients with intractable cancer pain. It also has extensive clinical experience in minimally invasive interventional treatment of non-painful conditions such as allergic rhinitis, hyperhidrosis, diabetic peripheral neuropathy, cold limb sensation syndrome, facial paralysis, and facial muscle spasm. The minimally invasive interventional techniques currently performed include: radiofrequency thermocoagulation and balloon compression for the trigeminal nerve; cervical and lumbar transforaminal endoscopic techniques, plasma radiofrequency ablation, spinal cord stimulation and peripheral nerve stimulation, radiofrequency modulation of nerve roots, paravertebral nerve block, and continuous infusion treatment through an epidural catheter; the main specialized treatments include: radiofrequency ablation for intractable rhinitis, painless shoulder joint release for periarthritis of the shoulder, and nerve radiofrequency thermocoagulation for postherpetic neuralgia; celiac plexus block and intrathecal pump implantation for advanced cancer pain; plasma knife nucleus pulposus decompression combined with ozone injection for lumbar disc herniation; transforaminal endoscopic removal of lumbar disc prolapse; lumbar paravertebral nerve block and continuous infusion treatment through an epidural catheter for low back and leg pain; as well as peripheral nerve block and intra-articular injection for localized pain.