I think the pain and the pills are also an integral part of House's character: They give people something to blame his charming personality on, while House himself knows that he's like that anyway.

I suppose it's going to depend on how they handle the second part. For me, if I know going in that the attempt is going to fail, it takes a lot of the dramatic impact out of House even trying to do something about his pain. If they spin the episode(s) to focus more on the personal growth than the results, it could work as you describe. I'm not saying it's impossible, just that they're going to have to do a particularly good episode to sell it to me.