The mypainfeelslike… campaign launched on 25th April 2016 aims to raise awareness of pain and support patients when communicating with healthcare professionals. The campaign is a collaboration between Grünenthal and Chronic Pain Ireland and supported by Multiple Sclerosis Ireland and The Parkinson’s Association of Ireland.
Research was conducted among people living with pain to establish how hard it is to verbalise pain and seek appropriate treatment. The findings are below. As a result a questionnaire has been developed as a tool to support patients when talking to their healthcare professionals and is available at www.mypainfeelslike.ie
This campaign is targeted at following core groups:
- General public
– People living with diagnosed pain
– People living with undiagnosed pain
- Healthcare professionals
– GP’s
– Consultants – anaesthetists, pain medicine etc.
– NCHDs
– Pain nurse specialists
Research conducted as part of the campaign found that over a quarter of Irish pain sufferers’ delay discussing it with their doctor
Over a half of people living with chronic pain in Ireland feel frustrated when trying to describe their pain
The mypainfeelslike… questionnaire is currently available at mypainfeelslike.ie and it has been developed as a tool to enable communication between patients and healthcare professionals. Complete it and bring to your healthcare professional.
Also as part of the campaign a series of images have also been developed by artist David Schwen. These images visually interpret pain symptoms such as, burning, stabbing and crawling under the skin and they will be exhibited around Dublin and in GP surgeries across the country. The Outdoor posters will be displayed on billboards and can already be seen around Dublin.
