Breaking the pain barrier.

(From New Straits Times (Malaysia))

Byline: JESSICA LIM

ONCE you realise that the pain you have is probably here to stay, it's time to decide whether you're going to let it control you. JESSICA LIM sits in on an intensive pain management programme and sees chronic pain sufferers triumph over their conditions.

With a deep breath and brows knit in concentration, Norpidah Abdullah, 40, lifted her right foot, flamingo style. She held the stance as long as she can before putting it down.

"Five seconds. Better than yesterday," said fellow participant, Sooriya Moothy Perumal, referring to a beeping stopwatch.

Around them, people panted and grimaced as they pushed themselves to beat the records they had set the day before - five lunges, two steps up a ladder and 12 on a treadmill, perhaps.

Coming from all walks of life, the nine participants of Selayang Hospital's Intensive Pain Management Programme (Menang) had come together for one reason - they were determined not to let pain rule their lives anymore.

For two weeks, they ate, slept, cried, laughed and learned together in Malaysia's first and only multi-disciplinary intensive pain management course. It pools the expertise of pain clinicians, physiotherapists, and clinical psychologists and psychiatrists in one all-encompassing pain management strategy.

Anaesthesiologist and pain clinician Dr Mary Cardosa said that the whole idea was to teach chronic pain …