Do patients always need to be referred to the UPCM Outpatient Pain Clinic by a doctor?

 

  • All patients who are treated at the Outpatient Pain Clinic have been referred there a doctor. This means that patients will always need a letter of referral of their treating doctor. Without a letter of referral, the clinic cannot accept the patient.
  • Normally you will give the patient a letter of referral or have your secretary or receptionist make an appointment for the patient and send the letter of referral straight to UPCM. If the patient contact the reception desk at the UPCM Outpatient Pain Clinic by phone or in person, without a letter of referral, he will be asked to get such a letter from his doctor or your specialist first. The referral is important as it gives UPCM staff the necessary information about the pain problem and the kind of treatment the patient may need. We can therefore not treat the patient without referral.
  • The patient may have had treatment at the UPCM Outpatient Pain Clinic for a particular problem before, a treatment that was completed. If the same complaints for which the patient were treated at the time return within a year, he or she do not need a new referral from you; the patient can simply make a follow-up appointment at the clinic.
  • If patients' last treatment at the UPCM Outpatient Pain Clinic was more than a year ago, he will need to get a new referral from you, even if it concerns the same problem for which the patient were treated before. This is necessary as the medical situation of the patient may change considerably in the course of a year. The patient will then be accepted as a new patient, so we can allocate enough time to examine the patient thoroughly and start the right treatment.

Once we have the letter of referral, we will send the patient some pain questionnaires about his pain symptoms by post, which the patient should complete and return using the enclosed stamped return envelope. It is only after we have received the completed pain questionnaires that we can plan patients' first appointment at the UPCM Outpatient Pain Clinic.

Patients with oncological pain do not receive  pain questionnaires.

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