Pain Management Unit

Contact Hours: 9.00am to 4.30pm, Monday to Friday
Address: Level 3 Co-located with Hospital in the Home, Bellarine Street Entrance, The Geelong Hospital
Car Parking: Limited to 2 hourly meter parking in the immediate hospital vicinity. You will need to bring change
Telephone: 03 5226 7254
After Hours Telephone: Via switchboard 03 5226 7111

Service Description:

The Geelong Hospital Pain Management Unit


PAIN is "an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage".



- International Association for the Study of Pain



One in five Australians suffer from persistent pain. This is defined as pain persisting for greater than 3 months. The Pain management Unit is a multidisciplinary unit where patients suffering long-term or persistent pain can be assessed diagnosed and treated. The aim of the unit is to aid and support patients in the long-term management of their pain. The PMU is co-located with the outpatients clinics of the hospital but is not an outpatient clinic.


Patients referred to the PMU will undergo a multidisciplinary assessment.


The assessment process involves



  • Consultation with a Pain Medicine Specialist

  • Consultation with clinical psychologist specialised in pain

  • A detailed musculoskeletal examination by a physiotherapist

There will also be questionnaires and other assessment tools used to. Following these consultations a treatment plan will be formulated and communicated to the patient in a feed back session. This normally occurs on the same day as the initial consultation. The conclusions and recommendations will be communicated to the referring doctors and the patient’s family doctor



  • a spouse, a close relative or friend should accompany the patient;

  • the Pain Management Unit questionnaire with details of prior medications, operations, illness, etc, must be completed;

  • All prior X-rays, other investigation’s reports, prior specialist reports, and all current medications must be brought to the Centre as a key component of our assessment.

The majority of patients referred to PMU will have had a large number of specialist consultations. This is why it is very important for patients to present copies of all previous consultations. In some cases, it will be decided that further consultations are needed with appropriate specialists.


All treatments are preceded by a comprehensive multidisciplinary assessment as noted above. Treatment may be provided on an out-patient or day patient.


Treatment options:


· Medications: rationalisation of current medication or introductions of new medications.


· Neural blockade techniques including epidural corticosteroid and local anaesthetic, intra-articular local anaesthetic and steroid, celiac plexus, lumbar sympathetic, etc.


· Other temporary neural blockade techniques combination with rehabilitative physical therapy.


· Individualised clinical psychology services for pain management.


· Individual physiotherapy services such as training in self directed exercise and activity programs, reduction in use of unnecessary aids, postural analysis and correction, etc.


· Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS) and acupuncture.


· Spinal drug administration via epidural and intrathecal drug delivery systems.


· Spinal dorsal column stimulation.


· Radio frequency lesioning (eg. Medial branch of dorsal ramus for mechanical neck and low back pain).


Regardless of the use of pharmacotherapy, neural blockade or other options to reduce pain, many patient will require treatment with one of the PMU’s cognitive behavioral programs namely the IMPACT Pain Management Program which aim to assist patients to return to as normal as possible physical and mental functioning, which have invariably been impaired in association with chronic pain. IMPACT stands for integrated medication reduction physical activity and cognitive therapy


Psychology services


· The psychology services are provided by one of the Clinical Psychologists.


· In some cases the treatment provided may be a combination of psychological and physical therapies at the PMU.


Making an appointment


Referrals may be made by either by the patient’s family doctor or specialist. It is vital that referrals include as much information as possible about current and previous consultations. The referral should include copies of previous specialists report, imaging reports such as x-rays, scans, etc.


Referrals should be sent to: Pain Management Unit Level 3 The Geelong Hospital Bellerine Street Geelong VIC 3220








Phone 03 5226 7254


Fax: 03 5246 5143


 


 


The Pain management Unit staff are:





























Dr R A Weaver


Pain Medicine Specialist and Clinical Director


Dr.DGL McCoy


Pain Medicine Specialist


Dr.A Muir


Pain Medicine Specialist


Dr.M Viney


Pain Medicine specialist and Supervisor of Training


Dr.M Vagg


Pain Medicine Specialist


Dr. D Lee


Pain Medicine Fellow


Mrs Pam Reeves


Specialist Nurse and Unit Nurse Manager / Clinical Nurse Consultant


Ms Jacqui Hunt


Specialist Nurse


Clinical Psychologists Dr. M K-L Siu and Ms. T Gibbie


Physiotherapists: Ms. E Strachan and Ms. S Monaghan


Administrative Staff: Angela Smith and Lorene Doherty

Date Updated:4/16/2008
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