Pain relief implant device helps Durham woman escape 4 years of chronic back and leg pain
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, chronic pain affects about 50 million American adults. It can severely impact a person’s quality of life.
It’s what caused then-28-year-old Meredith Mooney to leave her job as a kindergarten teacher in Durham. “I actually woke up on September 1, 2018, with excruciating back pain,” she said.
“Unfortunately, for the longest time, all we have really had is opioid related medications to treat pain,” said Dr. Jay Kumar, chief medical officer of Spine & Pain Specialists of the Carolinas, located in Charlotte.
With Mooney as his patient, Kumar first tried conservative approaches. X-Ray and MRI exams offered few clues to the cause of her pain. Mooney tried several rounds of oral steroids, with no success.
She said, “It took a very big toll on my body. I was tired of a Band-aid. I wanted a solution!”
Then she received a nerve block which also failed to provide a benefit for her.
That’s when Kumar turned to a peripheral nerve stimulation device called StimRouter by Bioventus, a Durham based company. StimRouter was FDA approved in 2015.
Phil Stead, a vice president of sales with Bioventus, says the StimRouter competes with four or five other devices on the market. “But it’s nice because it’s very targeted. It deals with regional chronic pain as opposed to general chronic pain,” said Stead, referencing the device.
The minimally invasive procedure uses ultrasound guidance to direct a thin "lead" wire placed near the target peripheral nerve below the knee.
A small, wearable power source sticks to the skin above the implant and communicates with the lead wirelessly. “And you can turn it on or off. You can control it with a remote,” said Kumar.
Stead added, “The patient programming piece is massively important, I think, because you are dealing with the opportunity for that patient to manage their own pain.”
Unfortunately, upon arriving for the procedure, Mooney learned that her insurance provider would not cover the cost of close to $8,000.
“I paid all of this out-of-pocket, so it was a choice I decided to make,” she said.
She now knows it was the right choice, “Because I hadn’t felt my toes move since 2020.” She is walking normally and is more active than she’s been in four years.
A Bioventus representative says StimRouter is reimbursed by Medicare and many private insurance companies. “Bioventus has an ongoing effort to work with all payers to help effect coverage based on the scientific evidence of success,” said the representative.
