Pain service - useful resources

Mindfulness

Meditation and Sleep Made Simple - Headspace -This popular website has a number of mindfulness and meditation practices, playlists can also be found on YouTube

Pain Management free meditation | Meditainment-A free guided Pain Management meditation for pain relief

Mental Health Support

YouTube Tamar Pincus: Psychology in people with pain 

Home - Cruse Bereavement Support -This website offers advice and support following a bereavement

Home | RASASC | Rape and Sexual Abuse Support Centre -This website offers advice and support following rape and sexual abuse

Home – Mental Health At Work -This website offers advice and support for addressing your mental health at work

Mental wellbeing | Healthy Surrey -This website offers mental health support for Surrey residents

Mental Health (connecttosupporthampshire.org.uk) -This website offers mental health support for Hamsphire residents

Talking Therapies

Home :: Mind Matters Surrey - NHS Talking Therapies (mindmattersnhs.co.uk) -This website provides talking therapy to Surrey residents and you can self-refer.

italk, Hampshire's NHS Talking Therapy Service -This website provides talking therapy to Hampshire residents and you can self-refer.

Exercise and movement is a vital part of your pain management

NHS Fitness Studio - exercise programmes from beginner to advanced: Fitness Studio exercise videos - NHS (www.nhs.uk)

Yoga with Adriene: Yoga With Adriene - YouTube

Pilates and Yoga with Katja: Pilates & Yoga with Katja - YouTube

Resources from Physiotherapy Pain Association  Links for people living with pain | Physiotherapy Pain Association (csp.org.uk)

When you live with pain it can be helpful to learn more about it, here are a few short videos explaining about how and why we feel pain

Brainman: Understanding pain in less than five minutes 

Lorimer Moseley: Why things hurt

How does your brain respond to pain?

Pain and Me: Tamar Pincus talks about chronic pain, acceptance and commitment

This is the NHS website for Fibromyalgia: Fibromyalgia - NHS (www.nhs.uk)

The Independent Voice of UK Fibromyalgia

This website has a list of Fibromyalgia support groups: FMA UK - Support Groups (RC's)

For any other conditons which cause persistent pain please visit the Health A to Z - NHS (www.nhs.uk)

The main purpose of pacing and managing activity is to help you achieve your adaptive goals, rather than pacing to avoid activity. It allows you to conserve energy for valued activities and allow you to build up your activity tolerance.

This website provides detailed information about pacing: Pacing for Pain Management | The Princess in the Tower

This website has patient accounts on their experience of pacing: Healthtalk

This website has lots of information about pacing and goals: Pacing and Goal Setting - Pain Management - painHEALTH (uwa.edu.au)

Printable Activity diary 

Pain medications form a part of your pain management toolkit, but as explained in the "How can I manage my chronic pain" section the correct dose of pain medication is the minimum dose to provide the maximum effect and for the shortest time possible, allowing you to stay active and maintain your quality of life. All pain relief can potentially have side effects, high doses of opioids particularly can cause:

• Breathing problems. Opioids can slow down your breathing to a dangerous level and possibly lead to death. This is one reason why taking large doses is dangerous.
• Opioid-induced hyperalgesia. This is when high doses of opioids might make your pain worse instead of better. Something minor, like a pinch, could feel much worse and affect a wider area than it would if you were not on opioids.
• Tolerance. This is when you need higher and higher doses to get the same effect. It might explain why opioids are often not effective in the long term.
• Dependence. You might rely on opioids within 1 to 3 months of starting to use them. This might be a physical reliance or a psychological reliance. The video below explains opioid addiction
• Immune suppression. Taking opioids can make it harder for your body to fight infections and heal wounds.
• Impaired hormone function. Taking opioids can affect your sex hormones. This can cause sexual problems, reduced sex drive, and infertility.
• Osteoporosis. Taking opioids can make your bones thinner over time, and increase the risk of breaks in the bones.
• Depression and anxiety.
• Increased risk of heart disease and an abnormal heart rhythm.
• Blood sugar (glucose) problems. Taking opioids can cause glucose intolerance (when you have high blood glucose levels) and increase your risk of diabetes.
• Changes in the brain. If you use high-dose opioids in the long term, there might be changes in the brain. This can affect your memory and concentration.
• Headaches or migraines.

This video explains what causes opioid addiction

Pain medications can include a balance of different families of drugs which used in the right combination can help manage your pain. These may include simple analgesia such as paracetamol or ibuprofen, opioids such as morphine, oxycodone, fentanyl, codeine and tramadol, plus non-standard medications such as anti-epileptic (pregabalin or gabapentin) and antidepressants (amitriptyline or duloxetine) which have been found to effect some types of pain. 

This leaflet from Live Well With Pain has information regarding taking opioids for pain.

Read

Ten Footsteps to Living Well with Pain is a step-by-step guide to living well despite your persistent pain: Ten Footsteps programme - Live Well with Pain

This website has podcasts and articles on a number of topics related to pain: Pain Concern |Pain Concern | Bringing the pain community together

A free pain guidebook to help you manage your pain: Pain Science Workbooks — Greg Lehman

Watch and Listen

The Choice Point By Dr Russ Harris - YouTube

Zara & Dr Russ Harris on the ACT concept: "Hands As Thoughts" Metaphor - YouTube

Tamar Pincus: Psychology in People with Pain - Why it Matters (Part 1) - YouTube

Tamar Pincus: Psychology in People with Pain - Why it Matters (Part 2) - YouTube

Do

A free-to-access programme by Nuffield Health designed to help you self-manage your chronic joint pain and lead a more independent life. Joint Pain Programme | Nuffield Health

Ten Footsteps programme - Live Well with Pain is a step-by-step guide to living well despite your persistent pain.

Sleep can be impacted by persistant pain and vice versa. It's an important part of improving your overall quality of life.

This website discusses sleep strategies and sleep hygiene: Sleep Hygiene - The Sleep Charity Including a downloadable Sleep Diary

This website provides detailed information on how to sleep better: How to sleep better | Mental Health Foundation

Some links to services for support with social aspects of life

Online Support

The UK National Volunteer Charity | Royal Voluntary Service

This website provides volunteers who can be on hand for transportation, shopping, prescriptions or to talk on the phone, and also provides virtual social activities

A list of free, online, boredom-busting resources! – ChatterPack

This blog provides a long list of virtual resources and wellbeing support

Housing

StreetLink - Connecting people sleeping rough to local services (thestreetlink.org.uk)

This website allows you to send an alert to connect a rough sleeper to local services for support

Guildford HOST - Riverside

This is an outreach and support service those who are homeless, or at risk of homelessness, in the Guildford area, aged 18 years and over

Housing & Homelessness - No Limits (nolimitshelp.org.uk)

Homeless England | Homeless Link

Food Banks

The Trussell Trust - Stop UK Hunger

Listed here are some useful websites that provide information and support for people living with chronic pain and healthcare professionals wishing to learn more about pain.

The British Pain Society

Healthtalk-chronic pain

Pain Toolkit - Pain Self Management

Pain Concern | Bringing the pain community together

Live Well with Pain

Flippin' Pain

Pain - NHS

There are also many books available written to help people understand, accept and live with chronic pain