Pain Medicine skills and learning outcomes

In addition to the CCT, the Faculty has produced expanded curriculum guidance

The below is intended for Stage 3 Special Interest Area (SIA) Pain Trainees, to help frame the curriculum in wider detailed learning.

Clinical conditions

Below is a non-exhaustive but indicative list of clinical conditions that the trainee should have the knowledge and skills to diagnose and manage by the end of their Stage 3 SIA training:

  • Acute Pain – Surgical and Non-surgical
  • Mechanical neck pain
  • Cervical Radicular Pain
  • Mechanical Low back pain
  • Lumbar radicular pain
  • Thoracic spinal pain and chest wall pain
  • Sacrococcygeal pain
  • Single muscle myofascial syndromes
  • Fibromyalgia
  • Widespread generalised pain
  • Post-surgical scar pain
  • Brachial plexus injury
  • Lumbosacral plexus injury
  • Peripheral nerve injuries
  • Peripheral neuropathies
  • Pain from vascular insufficiency
  • Common headache syndromes
  • Cranial nerve neuralgias
  • Post-herpetic neuralgia
  • Pain from spinal cord injury or pathology
  • Phantom limb and stump pain
  • Central post-stroke pain
  • Complex regional pain syndromes
     

Learning outcomes

The core learning outcomes from Stage 3 SIA pain training is for the doctor to be capable of delivering all aspects of Pain Medicine as an independent practitioner. This implies:

  • Having a comprehensive knowledge of Pain Medicine service delivery
  • Being able to assess a wide variety of patients with pain using a biopsychosocial model including, history taking, physical examination, psychological assessment and interpretation of investigations
  • Being aware of the treatment options available to provide effective management for patients with acute, chronic and cancer pain
  • Pharmacology of simple analgesics, opiates, NSAIDs, anticonvulsants, and antidepressant drugs
  • Becoming technically proficient in a range of procedures for Pain Medicine.
  • Having the communication and organisational skills to be an effective member of the multi-disciplinary Pain Medicine team
  • Demonstrates empathy when caring for patients with pain
  • Providing clinical leadership in the development of comprehensive pain medicine services, for the benefit of both patients and the organization acting as an effective teacher of Pain Medicine topics
  • Being able to assess evidence from research related to Pain Medicine including notes in epidemiology section below
  • In addition, the curriculum for advanced pain training, gives further detail on psychological treatments, Interventional treatments, Neuromodulation, and Surgical treatments for pain

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