PainLink News Vol.2, No. 1: A National Network of Healthcare Providers

Vol. 2, No. 1	Summer, 1997

PainLink, a community of healthcare leaders committed to alleviating pain, is an initiative of Education Development Center, Inc. made possible through the guidance and financial support of The Mayday Fund.

A National Network of Health Care Providers Committed to Alleviating Pain

Unrelieved pain is unacceptable to hospital administrators, to clinicians, and, most importantly, to patients and their families. Recognizing that most pain can be treated and relieved, the Mayday Fund was established in 1992 and is dedicated to reducing the physical and psychological toll of pain and its consequences. It has awarded a grant to Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC) to create Mayday PainLink at EDC, providing expert, practical assistance to selected hospitals and nursing homes that are taking action to improve pain management. If your institution has been selected to participate in the Mayday PainLink initiative, that is because it has demonstrated leadership in working for institutional approaches to pain relief for all patients and is ready to collaborate across a wider network of institutions. The EDC PainLink staff has an unusual combination of skills to bolster your institution's success: expertise in clinical pain management, organizational change, professional education, institutional needs assessment, action planning, and outcomes measurement. The EDC PainLink staff will work with you closely as you:

Build an interdisciplinary pain management leadership team.
A core group of nurses, physicians, pharmacy staff, quality improvement staff, and others who are committed to improving patient care will serve as an interdisciplinary pain management leadership team for your institution. Your PainLink Team will take overall responsibility for the project at your institution and stay in regular contact with the EDC PainLink staff.
Assess your institution's needs and priorities.
The PainLink project will provide an in-depth, carefully developed survey to (1) enable you to evaluate your staff's knowledge and attitudes about patients and pain and (2) identify your institution's strengths and weaknesses. EDC PainLink staff will analyze the data, and the resulting profile will serve as the basis for moving forward with specific action steps to ensure good pain management at your institution.
Plan.
Profile data alone cannot change practice--institutions need to help staff determine how to use the information to make a difference in the way pain is assessed and treated. Collaborating with your PainLink Team, EDC PainLink staff will work with your institution to identify specific changes in clinical practice or administrative policy that are likely to bring better results, to establish reachable goals, and to create implementable action plans.
Implement your plans.
Once your action plan is developed, you will begin to put into place an infrastructure of policies, procedures, and education to ensure that pain management is an improvement and sustainable. Implementation is the most exciting phase, because once clinician practice starts to change, the patients' experience improves and administrators and staff begin to see that their efforts are truly worthwhile.
Evaluate outcomes.
EDC will recommend strategies you can use to measure the impact of your efforts on health care professionals and your institution and, more importantly, on patients and their families.
Report your successes.
The EDC PainLink staff will assist you in your efforts to make your results public by suggesting professional meetings and conferences and advising you about news releases, patient brochures, and other printed materials. You might also wish, using our e-mail list and the Web site, to help other institutions and their patients by mentoring new PainLink participants.

Throughout the one-year enrollment period, EDC PainLink staff will be available for consultation and support--to be sympathetic ears for the inevitable problems that occur during any change--helping with resource sharing, networking among project participants, and promoting economy of effort within and across institutions.

Traditional and Emerging Technologies

An important function of the Mayday PainLink project is to build a virtual community, creating a forum for dialogue between hospitals and nursing homes and the country's pain management experts, linking those hospitals and nursing homes with each other, and providing ongoing communication between the institutions and EDC. During the pilot project, EDC PainLink staff facilitated online events led by Seddon Savage, M.D., Russell Portenoy, M.D., and David Weissman, M.D., on pain management for people with a history of addiction, action planning for institutional change, and engaging of physician support for pain management. This easy access to national experts and each other's knowledge-in-the making ensures that successful innovations in one institution can be quickly implemented in other settings.

Access to PainLink Experts at EDC

An integral part of PainLink support is the individualized assistance made possible by telephone contact between PainLink staff and your institution. PainLink staff include Mildred Z. Solomon, Ed.D., director of the Center for Applied Ethics and Professional Practice at EDC and principal investigator of the PainLink initiative; project director, Molly Lynn Watt, M.A., C.A.G.S., an internationally known expert in professional development, institutional change, and action research; a senior research associate, Judith A. Spross, Ph.D. (Cand.), R.N., who applies her extensive experience in the clinical management of pain to helping institutions improve their pain management practices; and a research assistant, Erica Jablonski, who is adept at data analysis and presentation and at tracking down important resources. In addition, PainLink's location at EDC means that the staff can take advantage of the broad range of expertise EDC offers, from technology applications to organizational development and change to research and evaluation methodologies.

Criteria for Participation

Evidence of senior administrative support and institutional commitment to pain management
At least four committed staff membersÑrepresenting nursing, medicine, pharmacy, and quality improvement/quality assuranceÑto form the PainLink Leadership Team (typically, however, the PainLink Team will have many members from many disciplines)
Access to or willingness to establish Internet communication capabilities
Willingness to make a year-long commitment to collaborate and change practice

Enrollment and Application

If your institution is selected to be a leader in pain management, or a PainLink Mentor Institution, your program will begin in September, January, or June for one year.

For further information about the project, please contact:

Molly Lynn Watt, Project Director
Mayday PainLink at EDC
55 Chapel Street
Newton, MA 02158
Phone (617) 969-7100, ext. 2537
Fax (617) 969-1569
http://www.edc.org/CAE/PainLink
e-mail MollyW@edc.org

Last Updated: April 18, 2000