A Chinese Guideline for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Neuropathic Pain

<i>Background</i>: Neuropathic pain refers to pain caused by injury or disease affecting the somatosensory nervous system, which is a common and frequently occurring disease in clinical practice, and seriously affects patients' quality of life. However, the treatment of neuropathic pain is a clinical challenge. <i>Objective</i>: To standardize neuropathic pain management, the Pain Medicine Branch of China Association of Health Care for the Elderly convened an expert panel to develop the guideline. <i>Main ideas</i>: Based on high quality evidence-based medical research on the diagnosis and treatment of neuropathic pain published domestically and internationally in the past 10 years, the expert group has formed recommendations for common treatment methods through rigorous argumentation and expert voting, to provide references for standardized diagnosis and treatment of neuropathic pain. This guideline adopts GRADE methodology to evaluate the level of evidence and strength of recommendation for the treatments of common peripheral neuropathic pain and central neuropathic pain. Chinese traditional medicine also plays an important role in the treatment of neuropathic pain, so this guide also provides Chinese traditional medicine drugs and treatment recommendations. <i>Conclusion</i>: The Chinese pain community has proposed the principle of "treatment forward, early intervention, prevention of sensitization, and prevention and treatment of chronic pain", which has played a positive role in improving the clinical diagnosis and treatment level of neuropathic pain.