Musculoskeletal pain: determination of clinical phenotypes and the rational treatment approach

Abstract

Personalized treatment is one of the basic principles of modern medicine. When administering a treatment, one should consider individual patient characteristics, comorbidities and, what is most important, the prevailing symptoms, as well as the clinical phenotype of a disease. This is directly related to chronic musculoskeletal pain (MSP), which occurs with underlying most prevalent joint and vertebral disorders. At present, MSP is considered to be an independent clinical syndrome.Predominant mechanisms of MSP pathophysiology allow for determination of its special phenotypes: “inflammatory”, “mechanical”, related to enthesopathy and central sensitization. Treatment strategies for MSP phenotypes should obviously be differentiated and based on a tailored and pathophysiologically sound of medical agents and non-medical measures with different mechanisms of pharmacological effects. Effective treatment of the “inflammatory” phenotype requires the use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, topical glucocorticoids, disease modifying anti-inflammatory agents. The “mechanical” phenotype necessitates the correction of biomechanical abnormalities, the use of hyaluronic acid containing agents, whereas the “enthesopathic” phenotype is treated with local therapy. Treatment of the phenotype with central sensitization is performed with agents effective for neuropathic pain (anticonvulsants, anti-depressants).