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Treating Patient Pain With Non-Prescription Options

What began as a non-traditional way to go through medical school follows Dr. David Saldivar in his non-traditional way of treating significant pain. To remind readers of a few of his credentials, he’s a Spanish-speaking Anesthesiologist who has completed his fellowship training in Interventional Pain Management. Dr. Saldivar’s empathy for patients, along with his motto: Tratamos tu dolor (Let’s treat your pain), highlights the compassion he shares for his patients, and our community, and he is readily available to do just that, treat your pain.

“Prescription (pain meds) don’t necessarily fix the problem, but rather create more of a bandaid over the issue,” Dr. Saldivar said. “What we do outside of medications has a longer benefit and greater success for patients to get back to their way of life.”

A more traditional way of pain management has been to prescribe more and more medications. Prescription medicine often has harsh side effects, including nausea, which affects people more than their pain. When pain creeps up slowly in a person they tend to learn to live with it, but when it becomes so great it causes nausea, which can be precipitous to seeking medical intervention for pain management. The least desirable solution for nausea and pain then is to provide prescription medication with nausea side effects and increased tolerance over time.

Dr. David Saldivar, a Spanish-speaking Anesthesiologist who has completed his fellowship training in Interventional Pain Management.
Dr. David Saldivar, a Spanish-speaking Anesthesiologist who has completed his fellowship training in Interventional Pain Management.

While that may outline the darkest experiences of options for pain management, Dr. Saldivar and his practice partner, Dr. Kyle Christopherson, provide longer-lasting relief than what prescription medications can do. Through a multitude of alternative techniques and tools, using their anesthesiology and interventional pain management training, they can do things such as ‘turning off nerves’ that are the source or heart of the pain with minimal side effects. These treatments can last 6 to 12 months and don’t impact your liver or cause your body to build up a tolerance, much like prescription medications. 

One patient that comes to mind for Dr. Saldivar recently is a young woman, he said, who experienced significant hip pain. She was skeptical at first about the options he offered her but came to him because prescription pain medication was not a long-term solution for a young mother. She expressed more relief from an injection than she ever had from opioids with the added benefit of not experiencing the significant medication side effects. 

Patient examples like this are the reason Dr. Saldivar says he loves every single part of what he does as a physician. 

“I help people get their quality of life back,” he said. 

When patients come in they are upset, have trust issues, and often experience depression many times due to the severity of the pain and the use of prescription medications. Our alternative methods help get patients back to their way of life, he said.

Wanting to be a new patient in the FHW Pain Specialist Clinic? Call (970) 858-2239 or visit https://fhw.org/services/pain-specialists/

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