"There has been considerable growth and change in the practice and teaching of pain medicine. It is a required part of the anesthesiology training curriculum and has been expanded to require three months of pain related training. Pain medicine fellowship training is evolving and the multidisciplinary approach to training has been codified. The required pain medicine fellowship curriculum has grown so large that it is likely that training for pain medicine fellowships will be expanded to two years. In light of its universal occurrence and the challenges of providing good pain care to all patients, pain medicine should be a required part of every allied health care, medical school and residency curriculum. Sadly, many physicians receive little training in pain medicine and are ill equipped to provide good basic pain care and are often unaware of the resources available from specialists in pain medicine. Anesthesia residents taking their required pain rotations and many other physicians and healthcare providers are challenged to find an affordable text that provides a solid review of the basics and can subsequently serve as a ready reference for future questions. Drs. Urman and Vadivelu have assembled a text that meets these criteria"--Provided by publisher.