A decade of improvement in pain education and clinical practice in developing countries: IASP initiatives

Abstract

Summary points:

1. Epidemiological studies, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, on the extent of pain in the community of western countries revealed a prevalence of around 18%, with significant effects on work and social activities despite 30 years of pain education programmes.

2. A survey by the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP) Developing Countries on the extent of pain education and clinical training, and the barriers to them, was published as report in 2007 and confirmed significant deficiencies and problems in all areas.

3. An IASP Developing Countries Taskforce was established in 2002 to facilitate improvements in pain education and management in developing countries through a grants support programme for bottom-up projects from developing country members.

4. Clinical training posts in centres in Thailand, South America and South Africa have been established to improve the clinical training of pain clinicians and, through them, to develop pain services in their countries of origin in which services are poorly developed or absent.

5. There has been a major surge in the demand for and development of programmes and clinical training in developing countries since 2002, reflected in greatly increased local activity in various regions of the world.

6. Based on the ethical/moral belief that pain treatment is a human right, the IASP has recently increased its levels of advocacy to support this belief.