Pain Cafe Conference Comes to Eden

What an amazing day we had on Friday 27th January for our Chronic Pain in Cornwall Conference. With the Biomes as our backdrop, and a room full of engaged people from across Cornwall, we began the day with expert patient Sean Jennings, celebrating the achievements of the projects' first year. The Pain Café project is a 5-year drive to support people with Chronic Pain. It explores ways to relieve and manage pain using the 10 Footsteps to Living Well with Pain program and creates safe spaces where people can share experiences, learning and develop tools together.

The aim of the conference was to support the roll out of the 10 Footsteps program to our newly trained pain support Barista’s. Baristas will be taking the learning and message of pain management to all corners of Cornwall through Pain Cafes, spreading the knowledge of the 10 Footsteps program to communities across the County in 2023 and beyond.

10 Footsteps to Living Well with Pain is a step-by-step online guide to living well despite persistent pain. 10 Footsteps has been created by a partnership of clinicians and expert patients – people who have used the program and support networks to change how they manage pain and improve their day-to-day lives.

During the day we heard from both professionals who are working in the health and social sectors and seeing the 10 Footsteps principals work on the ground, as well as hearing personal stories from people who are attending Pain Cafes - either virtually or face to face – and feeling the benefits. This new and unique approach aims to tip the focus of pain management from a pills to skills, using a personalised care approach to find solutions for each patient as an individual.

Over the next year, each Pain Barista, many who attended the conference, will be setting up Pain Cafes in their Cornish communities, supporting more people from across the County with this valuable work.

Currently there is one Pain Café running in Cornwall in Perranporth once a month, with the next session happening on the 14th of February 2023, contact Libby Huddy for more info by emailing: libby.huddy@imagineif.net and a virtual pain café group which also meets monthly. To find out more about where the new Pain Café’s are being set up and what is coming up in the future you can visit: https://pain.cafe/