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Course Outline

Introduction

Learning Objectives

Overview

Take the Chronic Pain Course

Introduction

The medical treatment utilization schedule (MTUS) was developed by the State of California Department of Workers’ Compensation (DWC) as a treatment guide for practitioners.  As discussed on the DWC web site, it is a review of evidence-based treatments for chronic pain.  Although it was developed to guide and analyze treatment requests, it certainly is an excellent guide of the research on evaluation and treatment in this area. To complete the course you will need to read the MTUS Chronic Pain Medical Treatment Guidelines (instructions for doing so are contained in the section below).  This is a 127 page document that is available in a pdf format.  The most efficient method is to print the guidelines for review and to take the test; although, the information can also be reviewed on your computer.  The Appendix to the Chronic Pain Treatment Guides (Appendix D) includes 559 pages of references and is not necessary to download or review for this course, or to take the test.  However, both the Guides and the References are valuable manuscripts and worthy of being in one’s research collection.

Overview

The medical treatment utilization schedule (MTUS) provides medical treatment guidelines for utilization review and an analytical framework for the evaluation and treatment of chronic pain patients. It helps providers understand which evidenced-based treatments have been effective in providing improved medical outcomes for the treatment of chronic pain patients.  The MTUS lays out treatments scientifically proven to cure or relieve chronic pain problems.  It also deals with how often the treatment is given (frequency), extent of treatment (intensity), and for how long (duration), among other things. The Chronic pain medical treatment guidelines document includes the information for this course.  More information about accessing the guidelines will be discussed subsequently.

Take the Course

To take the course, review the MTUS Chronic Pain Medical Treatment Guidelines.  At any time, you can take the test.  For this course, the individual Help-Feature for each question is not available.  However, you can take the test as many times as you like, until you pass.  You will receive feedback each time you submit the test for scoring, until you pass. We hope you enjoy the course and reviewing this valuable information.  

To access a copy of the Chronic Pain Treatment Guidelines from the DWC website, click here.