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Recommended Reading

Pain is a subject that sparks debate in almost endless ways. From the best approach to treatment, to service delivery, to the very nature of pain itself and to what it says about human’s inherent capacity to care and be compassionate and kind. Many such debates are the focus of our meetings. On this page, we provide some further resources and literature to inform, interest and inspire. Much of this material has come from recommendations by members and used to be circulated by e-mail. We hope that these links will be a useful addition to the website.

Please note that inclusion of an item on this page does not represent endorsement by the British Pain Society or the Philosophy & Ethics SIG; nor do the views expressed necessarily represent those of the Society or SIG.

Items are listed in no particular order. We welcome new contributions that will be of interest to the SIG's membership. Please contact Matthew Jay if you have something.

Finally, all items are hosted by third parties and links will open to third party websites in new windows. While we cannot therefore guarantee the continued availability of any particular item, please e-mail Matthew Jay if you find that any of the links are broken and we will do our best to update them.

Contents

  1. Burnout
  2. Overdiagnosis and overtreatment
  3. Healthcare delivery and funding
  4. Kindness, culture and compassion
  5. The neurobiology of pain, the placebo effect and the doctor-patient relationship
  6. Books
  7. Pain News articles
  8. Meeting transcripts

Burnout

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Clare Gerada

For doctors with mental illness, ‘help me’ can be the hardest words

The Guardian

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Overdiagnosis and overtreatment

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Charles E Rosenberg

The Tyranny of Diagnosis: Specific Entities and Individual Experience

Milbank Quarterly (via PudMed Central)

Bernard Lown

Social Responsibility of Physicians (Essay 29)

Bernard Lown’s Blog

Iona Heath

Role of fear in overdiagnosis and overtreatmemt

The BMJ (paywall)

Doctor Skeptic

Don’t just do something, stand there

Doctor Skeptic

Jerome R Hoffman and Hemal K Kanzaria

Intolerance of error and culture of blame drive medical excess

The BMJ

 

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Healthcare delivery and funding

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Mark Swerdlow

The early development of pain relief clinics in the UK

Anaesthesia

Enrico Coiera

Social networks, social media, and social diseases

The BMJ (paywall)

Steve Hewlett

My cancer diary: ‘There’s a new drug, but the NHS won’t pay. Private cost? £15,624 a month!’

The Guardian

 

Mariam Alexander Opioids don't work for chronic pain. So why do we still prescribe them? The Guardian

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Kindness, culture and compassion

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Milton Cohen, John Quintner, David Buchanan, Mandy Nielson and Lynette Guy

Stigmatization of Patients with Chronic Pain: The Extinction of Empathy

Pain Medicine

Jim Huddy

A journey into the humanitarian side of practice

British Journal of General Practice (via PubMed Central)

Andrew Solomon

Literature about medicine may be all that can save us

The Guardian

Iona Heath

How medicine has exploited rationality at the expense of humanity

The BMJ (video of speech by Iona Heath available but text of article is behind a paywall)

David Loxterkamp

Humanism in the time of metrics

The BMJ

Jonathan Tomlinson

How doctors respond to chronic pain

A Better NHS Blog

Jonathan Tomlinson

Do doctors need to be kind?

A Better NHS Blog

John Launer

On kindness

Postgraduate Medical Journal

Penny Campling

Culture, Kinship and Intelligent Kindness

Royal College of Psychiatrists

Paul Cosford Choice in end of life care Royal Society of Medicine

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The neurobiology of pain, the placebo effect and the doctor-patient relationship

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Fabrizio Bendetti

Placebo and the new physiology of the doctor-patient relationship

Physiological Reviews (via PubMed Central)

Larry Dossey

Telecebo: beyond placebo to an expanded concept of healing

Explore

Fabrizio Benedetti

The placebo response: science versus ethics and the vulnerability of the patient

World Psychiatry (via PubMed Central)

Mark Sullivan and Stuart Derbyshire

Is there a purely biological core to pain experience?

Pain (paywall)

G Lorimer Moseley and Johan WS Vlaeyen

Beyond nociception: the imprecision hypothesis of chronic pain

Pain (paywall)

Roland Griffiths

Psilocybin: a journey beyond the fear of death?

Scientific American

Peter Croft

Picking targets in the fog: the pluses and minuses of defining chronic widespread pain

Pain (paywall)

Iain McGilchrist

Half a brain (TED Talk)

Heroes not Zombies blog

Giulio Ongaro and Ted Kaptchuk Jr

Symptom perception, placebo effects, and the Bayesian brain

Pain (open access)
David Borsook, Andrew M Youssef, Laura Simons, Igor Elman and Christopher Eccleston When pain gets stuck: the evolution of pain chronification and treatment resistance Pain (paywall)
Mark Kargela and Mick Thacker Interview with Mick Thacker on the predicting processing model of pain Modern Pain Care and video available through Facebook
Phoebe Friesen

Mesmer, the placebo effect, and the efficacy paradox: lessons for evidence based medicine and complementary and alternative medicine

Critical Public Health

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Books

Author

Title

Link (opens in new window)

Various (edited by Peter Wemyss-Gorman)

Pain, Suffering and Healing: Insights and Understanding

CRC Press

Judy Foreman

A Nation In Pain

OUP

Joanna Bourke

The Story of Pain: From Prayer to Painkillers

OUP

David Biro

Listening to Pain: Finding Words, Compassion and Relif

WW Norton & Company

Bernard Lown

The Lost Art of Healing: Practicing Compassion in Medicine Penguin Random House
Wayne Jonas and Cindy Crawford

Healing, Intention and Energy Medicine

Elsevier

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Pain News articles

British Pain Society members also have access to Pain News, a quarterly newsletter. A number of articles that arise from our meetings are published in Pain News from time-to-time so members are encouraged to view back copies to find these.

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Meeting transcripts

Many of these themes are also the focus of discussion at our annual meetings. You can find complete transcripts of past meetings to download for free on the SIG's main page.

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