Epidemiology of chronic pain locally and implementation of a community PMP

Epidemiology of chronic pain across BNSSG and Implementation of a community-based Pain Management Programme to improve clinical outcomes with cost effectiveness

David Wynick is a Professor of Molecular Medicine at Bristol University and Consultant in Pain Medicine at the Bristol Royal Infirmary. His principal academic roles are as Director of Bristol Health Partners AHSC and Director of NIHR Bristol Clinical Research Facility.

His research is focused on the epidemiology of chronic pain (CP) which represents a major global burden and has a UK prevalence of 43%. He led: (a) the consortium which generated the UK Biobank CP phenotyping questionnaire, identifying 98,000 participants with CP, and (b) an analysis of CP using the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire system-wide dataset of ~800,000 adults. Results demonstrated CP is the second most impactful condition on health services after anxiety/depression, and the most impactful in the over 50s. It is common in women and more deprived populations, with a significant under-representation of all non-white groups/communities. He is currently focused on delivery at scale of pain management programmes in local neighbourhood hubs close to where patients live (rather than in hospital settings) and much earlier in the patient CP journey, maximising participation and minimising disability and medicalisation.