[spaetzleesser]

I feel you. My ex girlfriend had chronic pain and the US health system is terrible dealing with this. You go from tests to tests, surgeons quickly want to do their favorite procedures and otherwise they happily give you hardcore painkillers.

Two pieces of advice:

- Find a pain specialist who treats you like a real human and not just a science experiment or revenue source. there are some but not many

- My company produces implants for Spinal Cord Stimulation. The main indication is chronic pain that can't be treated with other means. My ex has one of our implants and it got her from seriously contemplating suicide to a good quality of life. A lot of doctors don't recommend the devices based on experiences a long time ago but the tech is way better now. The implant process is fully reversible unlike most surgeries. The main players in this area are Nevro, Boston scientific, Medtronic and Abbott (I work for one of them). Please look into it. I know several people who got their lives back with SCS.

Hope this makes sense.