Message From Our Chairman

Welcome to the Department of Anesthesiology website. There is a wealth of information about the department available on this site. No matter if you are a prospective student, resident, fellow, faculty or patient we hope you will enjoy your visit. There are links to other parts of the University of Rochester and the larger anesthesiology community that you may find interesting. The department has just undergone an extensive strategic planning process and is well positioned to make significant advances in patient care, education and research over the next five years. The motto of the University of Rochester – Meliora, aptly describes our department – “Always better”.

Mission Statement

The mission of the Department of Anesthesiology is to deliver “Medicine of the Highest Order” through excellence in peri-operative medicine, pain management and critical care; outstanding educational programs; and innovations in research.

 

 

 

 

 

In the Spotlight

The clinical importance of preventing chronic postsurgical pain 

In an editorial in this month's Anesthesiology, Dr. Robert Dworkin and colleagues discuss the clinical importance of preventing chronic postsurgical pain.  Following surgical procedures such as amputation, mastectomy, and thoracotomy, as many as 60% of patients continue to experience pain for at least six months, with approximately 10% reporting severe pain.  These chronic postsurgical pain conditions have major adverse effects on health-related quality of life, and many patients remain refractory to currently available therapies.  Although the results of studies of "preventive analgesia" involving various combinations of preoperative, intraoperative, and postoperative interventions suggest that acute pain can be reduced, placebo-controlled trials are needed to determine whether analgesic interventions are efficacious for preventing chronic pain.  The editorial emphasizes that a critical component of the design, analysis, and interpretation of future trials will be to determine what magnitudes of chronic pain prevention are clinically meaningful.  Such evaluations of clinical importance must reflect the magnitude of the reductions in chronic pain incidence, intensity, and/or duration that the intervention would provide.  However, even small reductions in the incidence or intensity of a chronic pain condition that can last for months or even years might be considered clinically important if the preventive intervention is safe, well tolerated, and convenient.  Because the risk of chronic pain can be quite low for many types of surgery, for patients without risk factors, and when chronic pain is defined as pain that is at least moderate in severity, safety should play an especially critical role in all evaluations of preventive analgesia.  As the clinical epidemiologist, Geoffrey Rose, noted 30 years ago, "if a preventive measure exposes many people to a small risk, then the harm it does may readily ... outweigh the benefits, since these are received by relatively few."  The full editorial can be read at:  Anesthesiology, 2010, Vol. 112, Issue 3, pg. 516-518