Chronic Pain
One in three people over the age of 16 have chronic pain and one in five children and young people are affected, leading to significant absenteeism from work and school and many hospital visits. 20% of adults reporting high impact chronic pain say that it renders them permanently unable to work, resulting in 28.4 million working days lost to the UK economy every year.
GIRFT is working in collaboration with the Faculty of Pain Medicine and the British Pain Society to help address challenges in service delivery for pain management. This is in line with the strategic aims of the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England to utilise a data driven approach for improvement, moving towards a preventive and early intervention approach, increasing the provision of care in community settings, and reducing waiting times.
The clinical leadership team for this workstream will undertake system level peer reviews on the provision and delivery of pain management services for chronic pain across the community, primary, secondary, and tertiary care services, and across the whole life course.
Our aim is to identify variation and challenges across the whole pathway and develop a structured model to ensure patients receive personalised, holistic and evidence-based care at each stage, with seamless transitions between services – in turn, improving the patient experience.
- Chronic Pain Clinical Lead
Dr Helen Makins
Chronic pain clinical lead
Helen is a consultant pain medicine anaesthetist, working clinically with both adults and children in Gloucestershire. She has worked extensively with Gloucestershire CCG and ICB on a range of projects for people with pain, from community-based social prescribing projects for children to holistic clinical pathways and evidence-based criteria for pain interventions.
As a clinical lead at the ICB for elective care for over three years, she has a broad understanding of system-wide challenges and opportunities, collaborating with colleagues in primary and secondary care to improve referral management and optimise interface working.
Helen is an elected board member of the Faculty of Pain Medicine, and her contribution has included leading patient and clinician pain education projects in the UK and West Africa, colleague wellbeing and the use of coaching and motivational interviewing skills to facilitate patient self-management.
- Chronic Pain (CYP) Clinical Advisor
Dr Jacqui Clinch
Chronic pain (CYP) clinical advisor
For the past 25 years Jacqui has been a consultant in paediatric and adolescent rheumatology and rare bone disease within Bristol Royal Hospital for Children, and medical lead of the Bath National Pain Service for children and young people.
She sits on several national and international boards addressing aspects of inflammatory and non-inflammatory musculoskeletal disease, pain and osteoporosis in young people, co-writing reports and guidelines for organisations such as the World Health Organisation, NHS England, NICE and the Royal College of Paediatric and Child Health (RCPCH).
Between 2019 – 2024 she was vice president of the British Society of Rheumatology, and chair of NHSE MSK child and young person workstreams. Currently she advises GIRFT’s paediatric rheumatology workstream and remains a BSR Trustee.
Jacqui publishes in areas including management of childhood arthritis, chronic pain conditions (disease and non-disease related), rare bone disease, hypermobility, diagnostic uncertainty (clinicians sitting with risk), and the impact of MSK disease on young people and families.
- Chronic Pain Clinical Advisor
Dr Graham Syers
Chronic pain clinical advisor
Graham is a GP partner at Alnwick Medical Group in Northumberland, and a clinical lead with the North-East and North Cumbria (NENC) ICB, where he chairs the Northumberland System Transformation Board and is vice chair of Northumberland Health and Wellbeing Board.
For the past two years has had an associate medical director role with Health Innovation North-East with a responsibility for developing and chairing the NENC Clinical Pain Network and being vice chair of HINENCs Community of Practice for Pain.
After obtaining his MSc in Sports and Exercise Medicine in 2003, he held a clinical lead post as a GP with Special Interest in the North Northumberland Intermediate Musculoskeletal Service. Other roles have included working as a GP trainer, being a locality director and prescribing lead with Northumberland CCG, and – prior to the transition to the NENC ICB – he was clinical chair of Northumberland CCG.
Find out more about GIRFT’s data-led approach and best practice resources:
- Chronic Pain News