NICE guidelines for chronic pain management

23rd September 2020

The draft guidance published by NICE on chronic pain management was published at the beginning of August. Our qualitative research (Q-PROMPPT) has informed us that it is important for patients to have a collaborative and supportive relationship with the health care professional they consult with (in PROMPPT this would be a clinical pharmacist) and this message was consistent with that in the draft guidance.

The research team has responded with our thoughts on the draft guidance along with other clinicians and research staff from the Medical School at Keele University and we expect the final guidance to be published in early 2021.

To top it off in the same week our principal investigator, Dr Julie Ashworth, was invited to comment on the guidance published on our local radio station (BBC Radio Stoke) in her role as honorary consultant in pain medicine with the Midlands Partnership Foundation NHS Trust. In a year when there has not been much to celebrate, a little stardom for Julie and the team came as a much needed morale boost.