Gramercy Pain Center in Holmdel, Red Bank and Montclair, Jersey City, takes an integrated approach to care that focuses on providing therapies and treatments that reduce pain and improve quality of life.
Guided by board-certified interventional pain management specialist Ajay Varma, MD, DABA, DABAPM, the practice combines physical therapy, home exercises, medications, and minimally invasive interventional pain management procedures to help patients get relief from their pain.
Gramercy Pain Center specializes in the treatment of many common chronic pain conditions that are caused by joints, headaches and migraines, fibromyalgia, sciatica, arthritis, cancer, the abdominal and pelvic area, nerves, and the spine, such as spinal stenosis, herniated or bulging discs. Gramercy Pain Center also cares for muscle strains, tendinitis and sports injuries.
The kind, caring, and compassionate team provides the highest standard of care and takes great pride in the services they provide. They aim to help their patients get relief from their pain and have a higher quality of life.
Patients undergo thorough evaluations to determine the source of their pain. Medical treatment plans are tailored for each patient and may include interventional pain treatments such as epidural injections, nerve blocks, radiofrequency ablation, Botox®, spinal cord stimulation, or the Vertiflex™ Procedure.
Dr. Varma is a tough cookie, very stern but listens to me and cares about my well being.
Dr. Varma is a great caring person and doctor.
Great doctor, very attentive.
Wonderful experience with Dr. V!
Dr. Varma was extremely attentive and informative regarding my condition.
Chronic pain conditions like back, neck, and knee pain can be hard to treat without knowing their cause. At Gramercy Pain Center, we provide tests to accurately diagnose your pain or joint problem. This allows us to create the best pain management plans so you won’t have to be constantly worried about your pain.
One of the ways we do this is through a diagnostic arthroscopic procedure to get a better image of what your condition is. X-ray, MRI, and other imaging tests help diagnose your chronic pain condition, but there are cases when a diagnostic arthroscopy is needed, especially for patients suffering from knee joint or shoulder joint conditions.
If you’re suffering from recurring pain in your knee, shoulder, hips, or other joints, then you might want to get it checked using diagnostic arthroscopy at Gramercy Pain Center. After learning more about your condition, we’ll make sure to provide you with the best care and treatment to help manage your pain.
Diagnostic arthroscopy is a type of surgical procedure used to examine the inside of your joint. It’s mostly utilized for diagnosing a shoulder or knee problem, but some patients with issues in their wrist, hip, ankle, and elbow may also benefit from this procedure. In some cases, orthopedic surgeons also use arthroscopic surgery to repair minor knee damage or other joint problems.
Like other kinds of orthopedic surgery, your doctor needs to ask a few pre-screening questions first about your diet, medical history, and medication. Patients are also given a few instructions to follow like avoiding certain medication before the procedure to ensure its success.
During the diagnostic shoulder arthroscopy itself, the orthopedic surgeon uses local, regional, or general anesthesia first before creating a small incision on the treatment area. Sterile saline may also be administered in the area to enhance the doctor’s visibility when working on the joint.
The arthroscope is also inserted in one of the tiny incisions made by the orthopedic surgeon. Once the doctor has enough information for a diagnosis, the saline is drained and the incisions are closed. For minor and easy-to-repair issues, doctors may also fix the problem immediately using different arthroscopic instruments.
Gramercy Pain Center is the trusted clinic when it comes to excellent procedures like diagnostic arthroscopy to find the cause of your pain problem. As the premier pain management center in New Jersey, we are dedicated to providing our patients with the care they deserve to help alleviate their pain and promote their well-being.
At Gramercy Pain Center, our team of physicians and pain management experts starts each treatment by performing a consultation to know more about your pain condition. This allows us to determine which pain management solution is the best pain treatment for you.
By using diagnostic arthroscopy, our doctors at Gramercy Pain Center can help you find out the possible cause of your chronic pain like:
A: Diagnostic arthroscopy is a minimally invasive surgical treatment so it’s safer than open surgery. However, there are still some minor risks that you should be aware of like infection at the treatment site or allergic reaction to the anesthesia used during the treatment.
A: After learning more about the cause of the patient’s pain problem, doctors can create and prescribe appropriate treatment plans to treat the underlying condition. In some cases, arthroscopic surgery is also used to repair the damage in the joints.
A: This varies per patient, but most of them need physical therapy to improve their joint functions, strengthen their muscles, and enhance their mobility. Just make sure to follow your physical therapist during the treatment session to avoid overworking yourself and repeating the surgical procedure.
Knee and shoulder pain should be treated immediately before they start worsening. At Gramercy Pain Center, we use arthroscopic surgery to diagnose and treat your joint problems like rotator cuff tear, meniscal lesions, and ACL tear. We also offer a wide range of treatment options for patients who don’t want to undergo shoulder or knee surgery to alleviate the pain caused by their shoulder or knee injury.
Start your long-lasting pain relief treatment today by booking an appointment with us.
Sciatica is a pain typically felt at one side of the body – it’s a lower back pain that travels to the buttocks and to the lower leg. Sciatica is caused by the pain from the sciatic nerve in the body undergoing nerve compression either in part or in whole.
Sciatica pain is characterized by a wide variety of pain experienced, from a mild ache to a sharp, burning sensation, and even unbearable pain. A jolt-like sensation may also be felt in this kind of condition.
Coughing, sneezing, and prolonged sitting can also exacerbate the pain experienced. Swelling in the affected leg may also be a sign of sciatica nerve pain, especially if it’s caused by a slipped disc.
It may be differentiated from a hip problem in that a hip problem like arthritis in the hip involves groin pain. Pain from hip problems is also exacerbated by putting on weight on the leg and moving your legs around.
Mild sciatica may potentially go away on its own or can be helped managed by over-the-counter drugs and home remedies like putting warm compresses and ice packs over the affected area and stretching your muscles.
These may be done within 6 weeks; however, if the leg pain doesn’t go away after trying these conservative measures such that it becomes chronic pain or if severe pain becomes totally unbearable, then it’s now time to consider going to a pain management specialist, preferably from Gramercy Pain Center since we’re experts on this field.
Other warning signs that you should look out for that warrant you going to the doctor include the following:
At Gramercy Pain Center, we first ascertain the diagnosis of the condition before we proceed with treatment. We do so by careful taking of your medical history and performing physical examination procedures.
Physical examination procedures include the straight leg test where we will ask you to lie down and we will raise your legs to pinpoint where your pain starts. We may also ask you to walk on tiptoes to check your calf muscle strength or do other stretching tasks to also know where the pain begins as well as to check for the flexibility and strength of your muscles.
We may also ask you to undergo other tests to check if the sciatica pain is due to other conditions like herniated discs and bone spur, especially if your pain is intolerable and non-improving. These tests include the following:
For sciatica treatment, we may prescribe to our patient drugs that may help provide sciatic pain relief. Classes of drugs that we may prescribe include anti-inflammatories and muscle relaxants.
With the guidance of our expert sciatica specialists Ajay Varma, MD, DABA, DABAPM, we offer physical therapy rehabilitation programs to prevent exacerbation of sciatica symptoms and to prevent the recurrence of injury.
This interventional pain management program involves exercises that aim to make you observe proper posture, and improve muscle strength and flexibility.
Another treatment option that we offer is the epidural steroid injection which involves administration of corticosteroids in the area of the affected nerve root. This procedure helps decrease the pain around the irritated nerve by reducing the inflammatory response associated with this irritation, although it isn’t permanent and lasts only months.
A: Patients can develop sciatica through the following risk factors:
A: Yes, and this is caused mainly by change in hormones, although increased weight from the baby and its position during pregnancy also plays a role.
Hormonal changes in pregnant women cause the ligaments to loosen up and they’re unable to adequately stabilize the back of a pregnant woman, causing slipped discs that may cause pain due to a pinched nerve and, ultimately, the development of sciatica.
The sciatica pain associated with pregnancy goes away after the pregnancy, though, especially when combined with physical therapy, heat compresses, and pain medications that are safe for pregnancy. Encouraging pregnant women to observe proper posture also helps.
A: Surgery is the least of the options to consider when having sciatica. Conservative measures like physical therapy and corticosteroid injections are more often considered.
However, if the pain doesn’t improve with these conservative measures, becomes unbearable, or you’ve experienced other signs and symptoms like weakness and poor control of urination and passing stools, then it’s time to consider sciatica surgery, especially because this might be due to bone spur or slipped disc that are compressing a nerve.
At Gramercy Pain Center, we offer effective and safe sciatica pain management guided by Ajay Varma, MD, DABA, DABAPM. Save yourself from the stress of having to endure sciatica pain by entrusting your pain problems to professionals who can certainly help improve your condition. Leave your pain problems to us and visit our pain clinic near you or contact us to book a consultation.
Dr. Varma is a tough cookie, very stern but listens to me and cares about my well being.
Dr. Varma is a great caring person and doctor.
Great doctor, very attentive.
Wonderful experience with Dr. V!
Dr. Varma was extremely attentive and informative regarding my condition.
