Aug 16

Written by: Lee Edwards
8/16/2009 11:43 PM 

July 20, 2009, Georgetown, OH...Pain is the hallmark of many chronic conditions and affects more Americans than diabetes, heart disease and cancer combined. In Ohio alone, a survey reported that 10.3% of the households contacted contained a person with a medically diagnosed chronic pain condition. “While there are many worthy awareness projects for the support of a variety of medical problems, there has never been a local public awareness project to bring pain and the debilitating conditions it creates to the forefront,” said Dr. Magdalena Kerschner, director for the Center for Interventional Pain Management at Brown County General Hospital. “To help correct this, in our service area, I along with a team of supporters from within our hospital and community decided to host a 5 Mile Pain Awareness Walk”, she said. The “Rein In Pain” 5 Mile Awareness Walk will be held on Sunday, October 18th at Cincinnati’s Sawyer Point Park, located along the beautiful Ohio River. The event begins with registration at 9 a.m. with the walk beginning at 10 a.m. Registrants will receive a free t-shirt with their $25.00 donation registration fee and can pre-register by going to the hospital’s website www.bcrhc.org. Registrants who are owners of a Scotty dog are invited to bring their pet along as this particular dog’s profile symbolizes pain management due to its resemblance to a part of the spine. A special guest of the walk will be Mike Roman, a Formula race car driver, whose own life experience with pain has led to his being the spokesperson for the Boston Scientific Spinal Cord Stimulator. Roman promotes the company’s Race Against Pain campaign. Roman’s long journey through 30 surgeries, four progressive amputations of his right leg and enduring phantom limb pain ended in 2005, after a decade of horrifying pain, when he found a Pain Specialist. He was taking powerful pain medications and being treated with drug pumps and single-source spinal cord stimulation (SCS) therapy, but it was a new generation of SCS therapy, Boston Scientific’s Precision multi-source spinal cord stimulation system, that finally gave him his life back. He has since eliminated pain medications from his daily regimen and dedicates himself to helping others who suffer from chronic pain. Roman works to shorten the amount of time it takes chronic pain sufferers to find a pain management solution. He brings a message of hope to the 50 million other Americans who suffer from the effects of chronic pain. The Center for Interventional Pain Management serves an Appalachian population in southeastern Ohio and northeastern Kentucky. Dr. Kerschner and her staff offer a wide range of pain management services including spinal cord stimulation, radiofrequency lesioning and disc decompression. The registration and sponsorship donations will be used to improve patient accessibility of pain management services in this rural area, and better equip the department for meeting their mission of providing quality treatment. For further information on the “Rein In Pain” walk, registration, or how to become a sponsor, contact Lee Edwards at (937) 378-7777.

 

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