Personal profile

Dr.Sanjeeva Gupta,

MBBS; MD; Dip NB; FRCA; FIPP; FFPMRCA

I am a Consultant in Pain Medicine at the Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, UK. I specialize in the management of neuropathic pain, low back pain, sciatica, nerve pain, neck pain, persistent pain after operation among other types of acute and chronic pain. I am also an expert in Interventional Pain Management (Pain Injections) and teach on multiple courses in the UK and abroad. I believe the best way of managing chronic / persistent pain is by using multimodal therapies

Awards

I was awarded the “International Award” by the American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians (ASIPP) for contribution to the field of interventional pain medicine. Presented at the Annual Meeting of ASIPP in Las Vegas in 2019

I was awarded a “Commendation” by the Faculty of Pain Medicine of The Royal College of Anaesthetist. Presented at the Annual Meeting of the FPM in London in November 2023.

British Medical Association (BMA) Medical Book of the Year award in 2015. Our book “Oxford Specialist Hand Book in Oncology: Practical Management of Complex Cancer Pain, Oxford University Press. This book was Awarded First Prize in Oncology category & Winner "BMA Medical Book of the Year Award 2015", chosen from 630 submissions.

I was invited as a Visiting Professor In 2018 and 2021 at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, India in 2018. PGIMER is a premier postgraduate medical educational institute in India. We currently have a memorandum of agreement (MOU) between PGIMER and the Pain Relief Foundation (PRF), Liverpool to promote education, research, innovation and clinical care.

Academics, Responsibilities and Achievements

I am a Co-Director of the Leeds Cadaver Course for Pain Interventions started in 2008.

I am an instructor for the European cadaver course by Interventional Pain and Spinal Intervention Society, USA (IPSIS, USA). I was influential in bringing the IPSIS European Congress 2018 to London.

I am an editor of 6 Pain medicine books

Atlas of Interventional Pain Management Procedures: A Stepwise Approach. Edited by Drs. DK Baheti, S Gupta, S Bakshi, and RP Gehdoo. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishing, New Dehli, London, 2023.
Oxford Specialist Hand Book in Oncology: Practical Management of Complex Cancer Pain. 2nd Edition, 2022, Oxford University Press.
The first edition of this book was Awarded First Prize in Oncology category & Winner "British Medical Association Medical Book of the Year Award 2015", chosen from 630 submissions
Oxford Specialist Handbook in Pain Medicine: Spinal Interventions in Pain Management. 2012. Oxford University Press. (2nd Edition in preparation).
Interventional Pain Management– A Practical approach. 3rd Edition. 2025. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers. New Delhi / London
Symptom Oriented Pain Management. 3rd Edition. 2025. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers. New Delhi / London
World Clinics: Pain Management. 2013. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers. New Delhi / London.

I have described and published a new technique of performing sacroiliac joint injection and has developed and published 2 improvised techniques for image guided epidural injections for sciatic pain:

S Gupta. Double Needle Technique: An Alternative Method for Performing Difficult SIJ Injections. Pain Physician 2011; 14: 281-284
S Gupta, et al. Technical challenges of performing S1 root block: role for double needle and multilevel needle technique. British Journal of Pain 2021; vol 15 (2): 129-133
S Gupta. Pre-Contrast Injection Multiple Needle Placement Technique: An Alternative Method for Performing Challenging Transforaminal Epidural Steroid Injections for Radicular Pain. Pain Medicine Case Report 2020; Vol 4 (2): 39-44.

I have developed and regularly uses 4 metaphors and analogies in his pain management clinical practice to educate patients in simple language the concepts of multimodal pain management, referred pain, diagnostic spinal interventions and the importance of doing regular physiotherapy exercises. These can improve patients' compliance with treatments and where appropriate, give them the much-needed confidence to better self-manage their conditions. In a survey of 142 health care professionals in 2024 the average score for achieving consensus on the concepts ranged from 70 to 73 out of 100 for the four metaphors and analogies included in this survey. 66% to 73% of HCPs were 'very likely' or 'likely' to use the four metaphors and analogies in their clinical practice (published in Indian Journal of Pain 39(1):p 24-28, Jan–Apr 2025.) We are in the process of obtaining feedback from patients.

I founded the Multidisciplinary North England Pain Medicine Group in 2008 with the aim of promoting multidisciplinary approach to managing acute and chronic pain, promoting local talent and to provide a platform to network to help provide better patient care and professional support to colleagues.

I was appointed an Examiner for the Fellowship Examination of the Faculty of Pain Medicine of the Royal College of Anaesthetists, London from 2012 to 2018.

I was an Elected Board Member of the Faculty of Pain Medicine of The Royal College of Anaesthetist, London from 2016 – 2022.

I was a Member of the Professional Standards Committee of the Faculty of Pain Medicine of The Royal College of Anaesthetist, London from 2016 – 2024.

I was the Educational Meetings Adviso of the Faculty of Pain Medicine of The Royal College of Anaesthetist, London from 2009 – 2017.

I was the Regional Advisor for Pain Medicine (Faculty of Pain Medicine) for the Yorkshire Region from 2010 to 2016.

I chaired the 19-member multidisciplinary British Pain Society and Map of Medicine spinal pain pathway committee that was instrumental in creating comprehensive, evidence-based, patient-cantered pathways for managing spinal pain. My inclusive approach fostered collaboration among healthcare professionals within the committee, resulting in the development of three focused pathways for low back pain and radicular pain. After peer-review process, these pathways were successfully published in 2012, marking a significant advancement in pain management. A summary of this work was later featured in the British Journal of Anaesthesia in 2013. This initiative has had a lasting impact on clinical practice, providing valuable guidelines for the treatment of spinal pain.

I am the Chair of the following Good Practice Guidelines published by the British Pain Society and the Faculty of Pain Medicine of the Royal College of Anaesthetists, London:

Standards of Good Practice for Spinal Interventional Procedures in Pain Medicine (2020):
Recommendations for Good Practice in the use of Medial Branch Block (MBB) Injections and Radiofrequency Denervation (RFD) for Low Back Pain of Lumbar Facet Joint Origin (2020)
Recommendations for Good Practice in the Use of Epidural Injection for the Management of Pain of Spinal Origin in Adults (2021).

I am one of 3 UK pain specialists invited to develop 2 International Comprehensive Evidence-Based Guidelines for Interventional Techniques in Chronic Spinal Pain which was published in the international journal “Pain Physician” published by the American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians (ASIPP).

Co-authored 9 Systematic Reviews on Lumbar Facet Joint Pain Management, Sacroiliac Joint Pain Management, Cervical Facet Joint Pain Management and Epidural Injections for low back pain and sciatica. All published in the journal Pain Physician.

Advised on Pain Medicine related matters to the National and International professional bodies including National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE); British Pain Society; Faculty of Pain Medicine; Spinal Intervention Society, USA; American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians, USA.

I started and was the Director of the “European Imaging and Investigations in Pain Medicine” and “Surgical Skills for Neuromodulation” courses.

I was the International Advisor for the “Global Update in Pain” meetings conducted every three years in Mumbai, India between 2001 and 2015.

Major contribution to knowledge base on pain and its management through scientific or clinical research.

Dr Gupta’s research is clinically oriented with emphasis on improving safety and setting standards in pain medicine. He has conduced several surveys focusing on setting standards in pain management to improve patient care and has presented several of them at the BPS annual meetings over the years, the last one being in 2023.

Dr Gupta conducted a survey of some of the guidelines published by the BPS and FPM to evaluate their outreach. Nearly 50% HCP’s were unaware of many published guidelines. He led and developed the FPM Guideline Implementation Guidelines and published this in the FPM Transmitter 2021 - Guidance Documents: A Guide to Development, Dissemination & Review (Transmitter Spring 2020; FPM, pp12-13.)

Dr Gupta has described and published a new technique of performing sacroiliac joint injection and has developed and published 2 improvised techniques for image guided epidural injections for sciatic pain:

S Gupta. Double Needle Technique: An Alternative Method for Performing Difficult SIJ Injections. Pain Physician 2011; 14: 281-284
S Gupta, et al. Technical challenges of performing S1 root block: role for double needle and multilevel needle technique. British Journal of Pain 2021; vol 15 (2): 129-133
S Gupta. Pre-Contrast Injection Multiple Needle Placement Technique: An Alternative Method for Performing Challenging Transforaminal Epidural Steroid Injections for Radicular Pain. Pain Medicine Case Report 2020; Vol 4 (2): 39-44.

Dr Gupta is an editor of 6 books on pain management. The Oxford Specialist Hand Book in Oncology: Practical Management of Complex Cancer Pain. 2014. Oxford University Press, was a warded the first Prize in Oncology category and winner of the "BMA Medical Book of the Year Award 2015" (chosen from 630 submissions). The updated 2nd Edition of this book was published in 2022.

Dr Gupta is an Editor of the Atlas of Interventional Pain Procedures – A Stepwise Approach. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers, Ltd. India. 2022. He has contributed 10 chapters in this book and over 200 anonymised digital x-ray images. Excellent review of the atlas in the journal “Pain Physician” in 2023.

Dr Gupta is an editor of the Oxford Specialist Handbook in Pain Medicine: Spinal Interventions in Pain Management. 2012. ISBN 978 0 19 958691 2. The second edition of this book is in preparation.

Dr Gupta is an editor of: Interventional Pain Management– Practical approach. 3nr Edition (in press); Symptom Oriented Pain Management. 3rd edition (in press); World Clinics: Pain Management.

In addition to being an editor of the above books, Dr Gupta has contributed several chapters in different pain management books and has encouraged several colleagues in the UK to contribute to the books he has edited.

Dr Gupta conducted a survey of 242 pain physicians (UK & USA) which showed a wide variation in performance of spinal interventions. He published this data highlighting treatment factors that should be standardized to improve patient outcome and safety and presented in an International meeting in the USA in 2019

Recent Publications (since 2019):

First Author:

S Gupta, et al. Metaphors and Analogies in Pain Management – A Survey of 142 health care professionals. Indian Journal of Pain 2025; 39(1): 24-28.

S Gupta, et al. Technical challenges of performing S1 root block: role for double & multilevel needle technique. British Journal of Pain 2021; 15 (2): 129-133.

S Gupta. Pre-Contrast Injection Multiple Needle Placement Technique for Challenging TFESI for Radicular Pain. Pain Medicine Case Reports 2020; 4 (2): 39-44.

S Gupta, et al. Interventional Pain Practice in the UK and the USA: A Survey of 242 Pain Physicians. Pain Physician 2020; 23: 127-134.

S Gupta, et al. Guidance Documents: A Guide to Development, Dissemination & Review. Transmitter Spring 2020; FPM, pp12-13.

S Gupta, et al. Awareness of the Guidelines Published by the FPM and BPS: A National Survey. BPS Pain News 2019; 17(4):184-187.

Co-author of articles:

Perioperative management of antiplatelet and anticoagulant therapy in patients undergoing interventional techniques: 2024 updated guidelines from The American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians (ASIPP). Pain Physician 2024; 27: S1 – S94.

Health Service Research: Methodology for Evidence Synthesis and Development of Comprehensive Evidence-Based Guidelines for Interventional Techniques in Chronic Spinal Pain. Pain Physician 2021; 24: S1 – S26

Epidural Guidelines: Epidural Interventions in the Management of Chronic Spinal Pain: American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians (ASIPP) Comprehensive Evidence-Based Guidelines. Pain Physician 2021; 24: S27-S208

Recent Chapters in Books:

First author / contributed to 5 chapters in the book: Interventional Pain Management – A practical approach. Eds. Baheti DK, Bakshi S, Gupta S, Gehdoo RP, 3rd ed. 2025. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers, New Delhi / London.

1. Metaphors and analogies for patients and health care professionals.

2. Stimulation Guided Pain Mapping

3. Cervical Medial Branch Block

4. Sacroiliac Joint Radiofrequency Denervation

5. Epiduroscopy for Patients with Lumbosacral Radicular Pain

First author / contributed to 10 chapters in the book: Atlas of Interventional Pain Management Procedures: A Stepwise Approach. Eds. Baheti DK, Gupta S, Bakshi S, Gehdoo RP, 2023. Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers, New Delhi / London.

1. S1 Nerve Root Block and Technical Challenges.

2. Lumbar Transforaminal Epidural Steroid Injections: Technical Challenges.

3. Fluoroscopy for Minimally Invasive Spinal and Trigeminal Procedures.

4. Pudendal Nerve Block and Pulsed Radiofrequency Procedure.

5. Cervical Radiofrequency Denervation in Lateral Patient Position.

6. Lumbar Medial Branch Block and Radiofrequency Ablation.

7. Sacroiliac Joint Block.

8. Sacroiliac Joint Radiofrequency/ Thermal Ablation.

9. Transforaminal Lumbar Epidural Block.

10. Cervical Medial Branch Block.

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