Precision Medicine Online: UC launches clinical trial for post-spinal surgery pain management
Precision Medicine Online highlighted a University of Cincinnati Gardner Neuroscience Institute clinical trial applying a personalized approach to pain management that doctors hope can improve post-surgical pain, reduce opioid dependence and reduce length of hospital stays.
More than half of patients who undergo spine surgery report poor pain control, and between 30 and 50 percent experience chronic pain for longer than 12 weeks (the time of routine tissue healing) following surgery.
Led by the University of Cincinnati's Owoicho Adogwa, MD, the trial takes patients' blood and saliva samples to see how their unique genes respond to different medications.
"Drug reactions vary significantly among individuals," Adogwa, assistant professor of neurosurgery in UC's College of Medicine, told Precision Medicine Online. "In spine surgery, traditional 'one size fits all' pain management is often inadequate due to genetic variations in drug metabolism."
Adogwa said early results of the trial have been encouraging, including shorter hospital stays for patients in the active arm of the trial.
Read the Precision Medicine Online story.
Featured photo at top of Dr. Adogwa in surgery. Photo/UC Health.
Related Stories
Love it or raze it?
February 20, 2026
An architectural magazine covered the demolition of UC's Crosley Tower.
Social media linked to student loneliness
February 20, 2026
Inside Higher Education highlighted a new study by the University of Cincinnati that found that college students across the country who spent more time on social media reported feeling more loneliness.
Before the medals: The science behind training for freezing mountain air
February 19, 2026
From freezing temperatures to thin mountain air, University of Cincinnati exercise physiologist Christopher Kotarsky, PhD, explained how cold and altitude impact Olympic performance in a recent WLWT-TV/Ch. 5 news report.