Member News
Sine Dolore
PRESS RELEASE
Health professionals recommend reducing waiting lists to address pain quickly and effectively.
Reducing waiting lists to allow for pain management quickly and efficiently, creating pain units in each hospital on the Balearic Islands, enhancing multidisciplinary teams in these units, increasing training, and shifting patients from public to private healthcare are some of the conclusions of the discussion group on “The impact of pain on Balearic society” held in the Insular Council of Menorca on 5 May in the framework of the activities of the third edition of Sine Dolore World Park.
This debate was organized by the Sine Dolore Association and Grünenthal Laboratories. Participants included health professionals, represented by Dr Marcello Giuseppe Meli, director of Aliviam-Clínica del Dolor de Mallorca, Dr Jordi Moya Riera, director of the Pain Unit at Mateu Orfila Hospital, Antoni Real Ramis, president of the Official Association of Pharmacists of the Balearic Islands, María Dolores Gómez Guillermo, member of the Spanish Association of Anesthesia Nursing, Reanimation and Pain Therapy. Gemma Fernández, president of the Association Sine Dolore and Eva Bech, a member of the Board of Directors of the Platform of Patient Organizations participated in the group of patients. The university was represented by Pedro Montoya, professor of Biological Psychology at the University of the Balearic Islands. Josep Pons Fraga, editor of Menorca Es Diari attended on behalf of the media. On behalf of the administration, María Cabrisas Pons, director of the Department of Social and Family Affairs of the Insular Council of Menorca, and Angélica Miguélez Chamorro, deputy director of Attention to Chronicity, Sociosanitary Coordination, Mental Health and Uncommon Diseases of the Government Health Service of the Balearic Islands attended. Juan Quintana, director of public affairs at Grünenthal represented the industry. The journalist Jaume Segalés acted as moderator of the discussion forum.
This study shows that 42.8 per cent of these citizens recognize that they have suffered recurrent pain during periods of six months or more at some point in their life and 82.5 per cent describe it as of high or very high intensity. In addition, 79.8 per cent believe that it is necessary for public administrations and policy makers to give more importance to pain and 85 per cent considers it important to improve specialized training in this field among all health professionals.
All participants in the initiative highlighted the work being done by the Sine Dolore Association in making visible the invisible, the pain, with initiatives such as the Sine Dolore World Park, the only theme park in the world against pain and the quality of life.
The president of the Association Sine Dolore, Gemma Fernandez, opened the debate with a research study on “The approach of pain in the Balearic Islands” based on a survey conducted last April with 400 people (of which half were men and half were women), between 18 and 75 years’ old, and residents of the islands.
