A project to support people living with chronic pain in their return to employment is being extended.
The Living Well With Pain programme began as a pilot in Lambeth, south London, last year, and has since successfully supported several participants in gaining the pain management strategies needed to get back to the workplace.
Now, the programme – created by rehabilitation services provider RTW Plus – has been extended to bring in support from Lambeth College, delivering an even more comprehensive employability offering to those who are currently unable to work.
The sessions are also moving from virtual to face to face, removing the COVID-19 restrictions the programme has had to overcome to date.
Living Well With Pain – held in association with Black Thrive – comprises three workshops to support people in their long-term employability by learning how to manage chronic pain, and looks at pain management strategies, working with chronic pain and career redirection.
The input from Lambeth College will help participants address vocational skills including putting together CVs and developing the softer skills needed for interviews and in workplace interaction.
Given the success to date, and further development of the programme, RTW Plus remain confident it could be rolled out more widely in the future, to support people beyond Lambeth in managing their pain to return to employment.
“Chronic pain can be very difficult to manage in the workplace, many people struggle to work, but through this programme we are helping people see it can be possible,” says Dr Devdeep Ahuja, clinical director of RTW Plus.
“The project we have run to date has been very successful, and we continue to see referrals from GPs on the strength of what we have achieved to date.
“Partnering with Lambeth College can only build on that further, and we already have a very good number of people signed up for the first session. We are very pleased with the response, but it does show how widespread the issue of chronic pain really is, the demand for places is high.
“I also think the face to face sessions will be very beneficial, given the very personal nature of the topic, in-person sessions will work very well, which we haven’t managed to do previously. This will help to build the programme even further, and hopefully get even better outcomes for participants.”
