PENS: The Patient’s Perspective
The Peripheral Electrical Nerve Stimulation (PENS) technique has been the subject of an in depth trial, which commenced in 2003 and lasted for some 18 months.
PENS is a technique which uses electical nerve stimulation, through needles that are inserted through the skin, under the watchful and expert eye of a physician.
The study (of 49 patients) showed that PENS can offer a radical alternative to medication when it comes to pain management and indeed, the results were quite dramatic.
PENS Study Results
In brief the study showed that 23 out of 49 patients indicated that after a PENS treatment, they had significant pain relief for 30 days. 6 of these had absolute pain relief for a period of 90 days.
In addition, 17 patients said that they had significant pain relief for well in excess of 30 days, with some indicating that they had at least an 80% reduction in pain for a period of at least 90 days.
These results clearly indicate the benefits of a PENS treatment, with 40 out of 49 people experiencing good results. From the perspective of the patient, this is important, since a procedure that is only minimally invasive can afford them up to 90 days of pain free living.
Who Did Not Benefit From PENS?
9 patients (out of 49) indicated that they had not experienced any significant reduction in the pain they experienced.
However, it is possible that these people would also not derive any benefit from any kind of treatment involving electrical stimulation, since PENS can be more effective that electrical stimulators used on the skin, such as TENS. TENS can be hampered from being effective by any scar tissue or if the patient is very obese, so having a nerve directly targeted by the electrical stimulator, makes PENS much more effective.
