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Acute pain service

The primary role of the Acute Pain Service is to provide safe and effective pain management to patients undergoing surgery. The service is led by a consultant anaesthetist and run by nurses on a day to day basis.

If you have had major surgery one of the acute pain nurses will visit you to make sure that your pain is controlled effectively. Our aim is to provide good postoperative pain control with minimal side effects to help speed your recovery after surgery.

Surgery

Our departmental objectives

  • The Acute Pain Service aims to ensure all patients have access to safe and effective pain management from admission to discharge.
  • To provide specialist pain management advice and clinical support to staff on how best to manage your postoperative pain.
  • Provide education and clinical support to doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals to improve their pain management knowledge.
  • We use various ways to control postoperative pain ranging from medicine and tablets and injections to using computerised pumps to deliver pain relieving drugs.

Our services

The Acute Pain Service covers

  • Theatre/recovery
  • Surgical Department
  • Orthopaedic Department
  • ICU/HDU
  • A&E
  • Maternity

We are currently in the process of expanding our service to the Medical Wards.

We provide:

  • Pre- and post- operative pain management advice
  • At least once daily pain management ward rounds, Monday – Friday.
  • Troubleshooting pain problems
  • Devising pain management regimes to control patients admitted with a pain problem.
  • Ensuring the patients’ pain management regime is suitable for discharge.

We provide a post-discharge telephone advice service and liaise with GPs to amend pain relieving regimes.

Oral analgesics – this is the simplest way of taking pain killers. The tablets or medicine will vary in type and form and will be given at regular intervals throughout the day. You should let your nurse know if you need extra analgesia before the next tablet/medicine is due.

Intramuscular/subcutaneous injections: this involves a nurse giving you an injection about every 3-4 hours. It is a common method of pain control after surgery. You should let your nurse know if your pain returns before the next injection is due as the dose or interval may need adjusting.

Intravenous patient controlled analgesia: this allows you to demand small amounts of pain relieving medication by pressing a button on a handset, which is attached to a pump. The pump is programmed so that you get the right amount of pain killer, but you are not in danger of having too much pain relieving medication.

Patient Controlled Epidural Analgesia: this involves a small plastic tube being placed in your back close to the spinal cord. The tube is connected to a pump. The pump is programmed to give you a set rate of drugs every hour. If you experience extra pain you will also be able to demand a small amount of extra drugs by pressing the button on a handset. The pump is programmed so that you cannot overdose.

Our team

Name Title Telephone number Email
Dr Mick Rothwell Director of the Acute Pain Service 01625 661307 mick.rothwell@nhs.net
Dot Pearson Lead Nurse 01625 661739 dpearson@nhs.net
Tracey Graham - Wollard Acute Pain Practitioner 01625 661307 tgrahamwoollard@nhs.net

Opening times

Pain Nurses – 8.00am – 6.00pm Monday -Friday

1st o/c anaesthetist -  out of hours

How do I refer/access the success

The Acute Pain Service is designed only for patients who are in hospital. To access the service call the acute pain nurses - verbal referrals are acceptable.  

How to find us

The Acute Pain Service is located at Macclesfield District General Hospital, at the back of Orthopaedic Theatres.

FAQs

Q. Do we run a clinic?

A. No we only see patients whilst they are in hospital.

Q. Are we a chronic pain service? 

A. No we are an acute pain service but do see patients with chronic pain whilst they are in hospital. If you need to access the chronic pain service see your GP for a formal referral.

How to contact us

Acute Pain Office: 01625 661739

 

 

 

 

 

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