Pain Management Service

What is the Pain Management Service?

Whatever you're experiencing, we offer a FREE Pain Management Service, which involves a private, one-to-one consultation with your Pharmacist. They'll take you through our Pain Control Test to find ways to help your pain, giving you immediate, personalised recommendations, as well as ongoing support. They may advise on simple adjustments to your current medication, or to your lifestyle, that could help you. If you have persistent pain, they'll ask you to complete the pain diary attached to get an understanding of how it's affecting your life, such as impacting your ability to get out and about, or affecting your quality of sleep. If they feel it to be necessary, they will refer you to your GP.

What can I talk about with a Pharmacist?

Discuss your pain - If you have a short term or intermittent pain (often described as acute pain), a member of our healthcare team will discuss your symptoms with you and what you have already tried. For more persistent (chronic) pain, our Pharmacist will ask questions about the type of pain you have, which will help them to better understand the problems you may be experiencing and to help you set some goals to overcome these.

Discuss your medication - If you are taking medication to manage your pain the Pharmacist will also be able to discuss this with you to ensure you are taking it properly. It will also be an opportunity for them to discuss the ingredients with you so that you know what other medication you can and cannot take. For example, cocodamol contains paracetamol, so you cannot take it at the same time as paracetamol.

Cold packs placed on your head and making sure you're drinking enough water may also help. Most people find that when experiencing a migraine, sleeping or lying in a darkened room is the best thing to do.

What happens next?

For longer term or persistent pain, you may want to fill in a pain diary for two weeks so that the pharmacist can see how you are managing your pain and what the effects are. Recording your pain in this way, can be useful for both you and our Pharmacist to understand how you are managing your pain and what effect it is having on your day-to-day life.

You can use the pain scale below to help as well:

Where is your pain on the pain scale?

Resources

asthma.org.uk/about/media/facts-and-statistics/
britishpainsociety.org/media-resources
global-pain-index.com
nhs.uk/Conditions/Arthritis