I just returned from Palm Beach Florida where I presented at the Moment of Change Interventionist Conference. This year I collaborated with Valley Forge Medical Center (VFMC)—our first Addiction-Free Pain Management® Center of Excellence. I was joined by Nancy Kompass, the Clinical Director at VFMC to present a workshop titled Successfully Intervening on Chronic Pain & Coexisting Disorders.

In June Valley Forge Medical Center’s (VFMC) Breakthrough Chronic Pain Management (CPM) Program became the first fully certified Addiction-Free Pain Management® (APM) Center of Excellence (COE) through Dr. Stephen F. Grinstead and the Gorski-CENAPS ® Corporation. One of the areas required for APM™ COE programs is to collect pre and post treatment data. Together we have pulled together some interesting outcome data that Nancy and I also presented to our workshop participants.

There are three areas we highlighted for review:

(1) Dr. Grinstead’s Ascending versus Descending pain symptom instrument

(2) The American Academy of Pain Management’s Pain Outcome Profile (POP) instrument

(3) An example of three of VFMC’s patient pre and post medications. All three areas showed significant improvement.

Many of the interventionists approached us at the workshop or at the VFMC Sponsor Booth and told us they wished they know about us earlier because they have been attempting to intervene on this population—people with chronic pain and coexisting disorders including addiction—and weren’t sure where to send them. Now they know.

I will be posting more about this conference and Valley Forge Medical Center’s Breakthrough Chronic Pain Management Program in the next few days along with some photos. To learn more about the type of chronic pain management treatment VFMC provides please check out my article The Need for Multidisciplinary Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

If you would like to see my upcoming trainings and especially to learn about my 20 hour (three days) Addiction-Free Pain Management® Certification Training on December 7-9, 2009 in Sacramento California designed to teach treatment strategies for people living with chronic pain and coexisting disorders including disorders including addiction please Click Here and scroll down to the December 7-9, 2009 for the description and how to sign up.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you are working with people undergoing chronic pain management and want to learn how to develop a plan for managing their chronic pain and coexisting psychological disorders; including depression, addiction and other coexisting psychological disorders effectively; please consider my book Managing Pain and Coexisting Disorders: Using the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please Click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please Click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.

I just returned from spending three days in Pennsylvania at the Allenwood Federal Prison. Not to worry I was there to train the staff in Terry Gorski’s Relapse Prevention Counseling (RPC) process. There were 15 clinical staff participants from both Allenwood Federal Prison and Lewisburg Federal Prison. We spent three days and 20 hours of guiding the participants through strategic ways to implement the seven exercises in the RPC process.

The core of this process is helping clients identify and manage the typical high risk situations that tempt them to return to alcohol or other drug use despite their commitment to recovery. We used the High Risk Situation List for Incarcerated Chemically Dependent Offenders that Mr. Gorski and I developed with the help of 50 inmates from Solano State Prison in California. The participants of this RPC training found these situations accurate and very useful for their treatment population at the two prisons.

Gorski-CEANPS® and Herald House Independence Press is very excited to be offering this new High Risk Situation List for Incarcerated Chemically Dependent Offenders publication, which should be out by early next year. For people interested in being trained in the CEANPS® Model of Relapse Prevention please go to the CEANPS® Website to learn how. We are currently offering a 5 Day 44 Hour Relapse Prevention Therapy School in Ft. Lauderdale the week of December 14-18 that you can learn about by clicking here and scrolling down to that training.

Please read my article on the role of relapse prevention in chronic pain management titled Relapse Prevention and Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Ariticles page.

If you would like to see my upcoming trainings and especially to learn about my 20 hour (three days) Addiction-Free Pain Management® Certification Training on December 7-9, 2009 in Sacramento California designed to teach treatment strategies for people living with chronic pain and coexisting disorders including disorders including addiction please Click Here and scroll down to the December 7-9, 2009 for the description and how to sign up.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you or a loved one is undergoing chronic pain management, especially if you’re in recovery or believe you may have a medication or other mental health problem and you want to learn more effective chronic pain management tools, please go to our Publications page and check out my books; especially the Addiction-Free Pain Management® Recovery Guide: Managing Pain and Medication in Recovery. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please Click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please Click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.

It was gratifying to read the recent email from the AAPM advocating for exactly what I’ve been writing and teaching about since 1996. I’m glad the message has finally been received and incorporated – I guess it’s true about it takes time for ideas to make it through organizational bureaucracies. Many individuals around the world have also been working toward integrated pain management approaches so it’s good to see the AAPM follow suit. I’m copying the email I recently received promoting their upcoming conference in Phoenix Arizona in October that included this announcement.

A New Way of Thinking

During our milestone 20th year, the leadership of the Academy deliberated upon purpose of the organization, the original intent of its founder, Richard Weiner, PhD (to build an organization that was truly interdisciplinary/multidisciplinary and included both allopathic and complementary and alternative clinicians), and what lessons have been learned over the years.　As a result of this work, the Board took an important stand in February by changing the mission of the organization to reflect our belief that the most effective way to treat people who live with pain is through an integrative approach. While we recognize that we may face economic, political, and social challenges in our work to achieve this, we also know that an individualized, patient-centered model will lead ultimately to the best patient outcomes, and will advance the field of pain management overall.

In line with the principles of integrative medicine, the Academy defines the characteristics of integrative pain management as being:

Patient-centered and reaffirming of the importance of the relationship between practitioner and patient. This approach promotes optimal wellness and helps patients reach their goals with a greater sense of personal control. Focused on the whole person—mind, body, and spirit, and within the context of their communities Informed by evidence

Open to bringing together all appropriate therapeutic approaches and healthcare professionals to reduce pain and achieve optimal health and healing.

This focus on collaboration for the best possible care of people with pain reinforces the founding mission of the Academy, and informs our work as we move forward. This year we will　celebrate our 20th birthday and explore how through an integrative approach we can achieve optimal patient care.

Please read my article published in June 2008 that covers what our Addiction-Free Pain Management® System considers quality and effective chronic pain management titled The Need for Multidisciplinary Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

If you would like to see my upcoming trainings and especially to learn about my 20 hour (three days) Addiction-Free Pain Management® Certification Training on December 7-9, 2009 in Sacramento California designed to teach treatment strategies for people living with chronic pain and coexisting disorders including disorders including addiction please Click Here and scroll down to the December 7-9, 2009 for the description and how to sign up.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you are working with people undergoing chronic pain management and want to learn how to develop a plan for managing their chronic pain and coexisting psychological disorders; including depression, addiction and other coexisting psychological disorders effectively; please consider my book Managing Pain and Coexisting Disorders: Using the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please Click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please Click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.