Talking tour March 2020
In a week’s time I head off to South Africa to deliver a series of Understand Pain talks. This is a great opportunity to connect with clinicians, therapists and others who work with people suffering pain. Invited by TensCare, we will be working together on this tour to educate, enable and empower people to provide best care for pain.
TensCare: We provide drug-free pain relief for the long-term treatment of chronic pain conditions and the relief of the acute pain during childbirth
One of the main issues and reasons why pain is such an enormous global health burden is the misunderstanding of what it is and how it arises. The predominant approach remains biomedical despite the fact that this model does not deliver solutions. Society needs us to build on our knowledge about pain and offer person-first care: it is the person who feels pain, not the body part.
In brief, I will be talking about the purpose of pain, why it persists and what we can do to help and encourage people to move on and live fulfilling lives in their own unique way. This is using strengths based coaching together with the latest pain and related sciences, focusing on meeting the person’s needs. This is the essence of Pain Coaching, which is a skillset and way of delivering care that sees a person first, not a patient or a list of problems. Instead, we see someone with strengths and the potential to improve their life. We guide and facilitate this growth in a positive way.
My hope and aim as ever, is to bring the latest understanding and thinking about pain to society in a practical way.
Towards the end of the trip I plan to run #upandrun 13 in and around Cape Town, taking in Table Mountain. This is the awareness raising part of the Understand Pain social enterprise work, as I continue with monthly ultramarathons.
You can follow my projects here on the UP website and blog, and on Twitter (@painphysio), Insta (@paincoach) and Facebook (Specialist Pain Physio).
understand pain 