Patients with chronic pain are being failed by the NHS

According to a recent study looking into services available for those with chronic pain, the NHS is only employing one specialist for every 32,000 sufferers.

The report, which includes experiences taken from 4,400 members of the public, revealed that more than a quarter had suffered with chronic pain at some point during the past five years and of those only 23 per cent had been referred to a specialist who manages pain.

Chronic pain is characterised by a continuous pain which lasts for a period of twelve weeks or more and it is estimated to affect around eight million Brits on a daily basis.

Additional findings highlighted in the report included one third of patients not knowing how to take their medication correctly, only one in four chronic sufferers having ever been referred for specialist care and more than half (57 per cent) of pain sufferers remaining unaware of potential side affects.

Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients Association has said that though the exact financial cost of chronic pain is unknown, back pain alone costs the economy an estimated £5 billion a year.

If you are suffering from chronic pain and are currently on the waiting list for treatment then an option worth considering to help ease symptoms is that of hypnotherapy. Hypnotherapy has been successful in significantly reducing chronic pain symptoms in a huge number of patients through the process of accessing an individuals subconscious and retraining the mind.

If you are interested in hypnotherapy for chronic pain then please use our advanced search tool to find a hypnotherapist specialising in that particular area.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 13th, 2011 at 1:44 pm and is filed under Chronic Pain. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.