Airing Pain 121: Living with Persistent Pain in Wales

Dis­cussing the future of chron­ic pain ser­vices across Wales

This edi­tion of Air­ing Pain has been par­tial­ly fund­ed by an edu­ca­tion­al grant from Grü­nen­thal Lim­it­ed, donat­ed for this pur­pose.

In April 2019, the Min­is­ter for Health and Social Ser­vices in Wales launched the guid­ance doc­u­ment Liv­ing with Per­sis­tent Pain in Wales. Lat­er, in Decem­ber, the Chron­ic Pain Pol­i­cy Coali­tion brought togeth­er some of Wales’s lead­ing pain experts at the home of the Welsh par­lia­ment (or Senedd Cym­ru) in Cardiff, at an event chaired by Neil Bet­teridge, co-chair of the Chron­ic Pain Pol­i­cy Coali­tion, a group which brings togeth­er a wide range of chron­ic pain stake­hold­ers includ­ing pro­fes­sion­al bod­ies, patient organ­i­sa­tions, par­lia­men­tar­i­ans and indus­try rep­re­sen­ta­tives from across the UK.

This edi­tion of Air­ing Pain was record­ed live at the event, where clin­i­cians, aca­d­e­mics, pol­i­cy-mak­ers and peo­ple liv­ing with pain came togeth­er to dis­cuss both the new doc­u­ment and the future of chron­ic pain ser­vices across the region.

With thanks to the Chron­ic Pain Pol­i­cy Coali­tion, the Welsh Gov­ern­ment and the con­fer­ence organ­is­ers for facil­i­tat­ing the record­ing of this event.

Issues cov­ered in this pro­gramme include: Arthri­tis, avail­abil­i­ty of pain ser­vices, edu­ca­tion, equal­i­ty, exer­cise, fatigue, fibromyal­gia, chron­ic pri­ma­ry pain, fund­ing of pain ser­vices, GP, opi­oids, osteoarthri­tis, phys­io­ther­a­py, pol­i­cy, refer­ral scheme, rheuma­tol­ogy, soci­ety, pol­i­cy, vis­i­bil­i­ty and Welsh government.

Con­trib­u­tors:

• Neil Bet­teridge, Co-Chair, Chron­ic Pain Pol­i­cy Coalition
• Dr Paul Cameron, Spe­cial­ty Advi­sor to the Chief Med­ical Offi­cer for Scotland
• Pro­fes­sor Ernest Choy, Head of Rheuma­tol­ogy, Cardiff University
• Mary Cow­ern, Wales Direc­tor, Ver­sus Arthritis
• David Eas­t­on, Phys­io­ther­a­pist, Hywel Da NHS Trust
• Dr Lucy Mor­ris, GP part­ner, Belle­vue Prac­tice, Newport
• Pro­fes­sor Ann Tay­lor, Pro­fes­sor in Med­ical Edu­ca­tion, Cardiff University.

More infor­ma­tion:

• The Chron­ic Pain Pol­i­cy Coali­tion – chronicpainpolicycoalition.com
• Ver­sus Arthri­tis – ver­susarthritis.org
• Welshp Pain Soci­ety – welshpainsociety.org.uk
• Liv­ing with Per­sis­tent Pain in Wales PDF guidelines.