Critical limb ischemia (CLI) is the end stage of peripheral arterial disease in the legs and is a consequence of deteriorating blood flow supply to the lower limbs. The clinical definition of CLI includes peripheral arterial disease and recurrent rest pain for at least two weeks with or without ulcers or gangrene.
In patients not amenable to revascularization - around 35% - amputation or palliative conservative care remains the options. Pain control is a vital part of any treatment of these patients. Besides being the principal conservative treatment, also patients undergoing revascularization experience severe pain both during work up and after surgery.
Experimental data indicate that pain in CLI is multimodal and to a large extent neuropathic. Still, current therapy is mostly based on opioid treatment, which clinically often affects pain moderately. The doses required to influence pain are also associated to severe side effects. Accordingly, there is a great need to improve pain control in the rather common disease CLI.
comparisons: pregabalin up to 600mg daily in addition to regular pain regimens compared to placebo and regular pain regimens.
