One of the most exciting speaking engagements for me this year was organised by Georgie Oldfield with support from SIRPA's executive board: Chronic Pain – To Suppress, manage or Cure?
All the speakers were health practitioners – doctors, researchers, psychotherapists - interested in the work of Dr John Sarno, a spine surgeon who identified TMS (also known as PPD) as a condition responsible for many cases of chronic back pain. John Sarno's daughter Christina attended the research meeting and the conference. She felt that her father would be thrilled that the work he started over 40 years ago is gathering pace.
The outcomes of this conference include plans for another gathering at the Royal Society of Medicine in November 2016, many more health professionals engaged in understanding the neurophysiology of chronic pain, a TMS research group formed by all the interested speakers and a hardship fund set up by SIRPA.
My personal guest was John Lindsay, chair of Chronic Pain Ireland. Here is what he wrote after the event:
“My congratulations on a great event.... I was really impressed by your speakers and as a result of attending the event I am going to re-evaluate our approach to Self Management of Chronic Pain. My sincere thanks for the 'guest' invitation.”
More information about what the speakers said in our forthcoming Blogs!
Glossary of terms:
SIRPA: Stress Illness Recovery Practitioners Association
TMS: Tension Myositis Syndrome
PPD: Psychophysiological Disorders
The executive board of SIRPA at the conference on 26th April 2015