Clayton is fifteen minutes from our Woodson Road office, and that matters more than it sounds. Pain care often takes repeat visits. First a diagnostic block (a numbing test), then the result, then the treatment aimed at what the block found. That only works if the trip is not a project. From the county seat it is a straight run up I-170.
Take I-170 north from Clayton and exit toward Lambert. The office sits at 4477 Woodson Road, Suite 100, St. Louis, MO 63134, right beside St. Louis Lambert International Airport. Parking is on site and level with the entrance. That helps if walking is part of the problem you are coming to discuss.
Hours are Monday to Friday, 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM. You do not need a referral from another doctor. You do not need to be an existing patient. Both offices, including the second at 12174 Natural Bridge Rd, are on the locations page.
Most people from Clayton have already had scans and at least one shot. The problem is not that the treatments were wrong. The common thread is that nobody proved which part was causing the pain before treating it.
Wear and tear shows up on scans in people with no pain at all. So a spot on a film does not prove it is your problem. A diagnostic block (a numbing test) settles it another way. Numb one structure, then see if the pain goes away. That is a test with a result, not an opinion. It is the difference between aiming and guessing.
The reasoning is laid out in what imaging can and cannot show about pain. When the scan reads normal but the pain is real, see deep low back pain with a normal MRI.
People from central county often cannot lose months to trial and error. Courts, offices and hospitals all sit a few blocks apart. The work day does not stop for a pain problem.
That shapes what we use. Facet joint injections and radiofrequency ablation once a diagnostic block confirms the source. Sacroiliac joint injection when the pain sits low and to one side. Epidural steroid injection and selective nerve root block when symptoms travel down an arm or leg. Electrodiagnostic testing when the question is whether a nerve is working.
When the pain burns and the automatic nervous system is involved, CRPS and RSD treatment and ketamine therapy are available. The mental side of pain is treated here, not sent out. See counseling for chronic pain.
Scans, nerve tests and image-guided procedures are all on site. A visit can often move from question to answer with no second trip somewhere else. When a same-day procedure fits, we can talk about it at the first visit. You do not wait weeks. See same-day and emergency visits.
If you already take opioids, the aim is to treat the source of the pain. Then you need less medicine over time. We avoid withdrawal during any taper. That approach is laid out under opioid stewardship.
About fifteen minutes up I-170 outside rush hour, with on-site parking level with the entrance. Both offices and directions are on the locations page.
Not by itself. The better question is whether the part treated was the one causing the pain. A diagnostic block can answer that. See choosing a pain specialist after treatment has not helped.
Yes. No referral is needed. You do not need to be an existing patient. You can set up a visit through the appointment request form.
Yes. It is the rule, not the exception. Your family doctor or surgeon needs our test results to decide anything. See orthopedic surgeon, neurosurgeon, or pain physician.
Normal scans are common in people with real pain we can treat. A normal scan does not end the search. See what imaging can and cannot show about pain.
To be evaluated by Dr. Gurpreet Singh Padda, MD, MBA, MHP, request an appointment, call (314) 481-5000, or text (314) 886-5902. We serve the St. Louis region in Missouri and Illinois. Nearby towns have their own pages, including St. Louis, Chesterfield, Ferguson and Bridgeton.
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Same-day and emergency appointments are available.