• Hong Kong University School of Professional and Continuing Education

Integrative Pain Management - Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine

Improve your pain diagnosis and treatment as you learn how to combine Chinese and Western medicine for effective pain management.

1,081 enrolled on this course

Pain management with Chinese and Western medicines

Integrative Pain Management - Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine

1,081 enrolled on this course

  • 4 weeks

  • 3 hours per week

  • Digital certificate when eligible

  • Intermediate level

Find out more about how to join this course

Develop your understanding of pain management

Pain, though common, is often extremely complex to treat and diagnose. Health professionals must navigate through the many different causes and influential factors to provide effective treatment for their patients.

On this four-week course, you’ll learn how to use an integrative clinical approach to improve pain diagnosis and treatment. You’ll discover the different pain management approaches in both Chinese and Western medicine before learning how to combine the two for effective results.

By the end, you’ll have professional pain management knowledge to take into your workplace.

Explore the pain pathway and causes of pain

Furthering your knowledge of pain and its symptoms, you’ll explore pain pathway, threshold, and types of pain.

This knowledge will help you understand pain and its burden, and how to address it timely and properly by using a comprehensive assessment.

Delve into Western medicine and traditional Chinese medicine

You’ll unpack the different treatment approaches in Western medicine before exploring traditional Chinese medicine and how it treats both symptoms and root causes.

You’ll be given an overview of Chinese medicine and how its two key notions – holism and pattern identification – can be applied in pain management.

Next, you’ll investigate the existing situation between Chinese and Western medicine before analysing the upcoming collaboration between the two approaches to help enhance pain treatment.

Learn from the experts at HKU SPACE

Throughout the course, you’ll be guided by the experts at HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education (HKU SPACE) and to help you explore and understand a variety of pain management strategies.

With this knowledge, you’ll be equipped to improve your pain diagnosis and treatment in your workplace.

Skip to 0 minutes and 9 seconds Pain is an unpleasant yet important and common sensation in humankind. Throughout our lives, pain comes and goes for some reasons like skin burns, cuts and bruises, stomachache and fractures. Pain seems inevitable, so its diagnosis, evaluation and treatment are essential. How do traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine manage pain? Can we combine the both approaches to form an integrative one? In this course, we’re going to explore how these two approaches apply to pain management. A series of fundamental steps and processes in pain management will be examined through the integration of Traditional Chinese and Western medicine. Besides the steps and processes, this course also showcases a theoretical and practical experience of integrative pain management.

Skip to 1 minute and 14 seconds Join this MOOC now to equip yourself with professional knowledge of integrative pain management.

Syllabus

  • Week 1

    Understanding on Pain - the Western Medicine Perspective

    • Course Introduction

      In this activity, you are going to watch the introductory video, that introduces the course and meet our lead educator, Dr Jenny Tung.

    • Introduction to physiology and pathology of pain

      This activity presents the key elements of physiology and pathology of pain.

    • Diagnosis and evaluation of pain

      This activity introduces different types of pain and how pain is assessed.

    • Overview of pain management

      The activity introduces a number of pain management strategies such as pharmacological agents, adjuvant analgesics and multi-disciplinary pain management programme.

    • Summary of the week

      This activity gives you a brief summary of what you have learnt this week.

  • Week 2

    Severity of Painful Symptoms & Need to Properly Address the Issue

    • Introduction

      This activity introduces the pain pathway, threshold and types of pain.

    • Severity of pain

      This activity explains pain and its burden.

    • Addressing pain timely and properly: comprehensive assessment

      This activity presents how pain could be addressed timely and properly by using comprehensive assessment.

    • Addressing pain timely and properly: individualised treatment approach

      This activity presents how pain could be addressed timely and properly by using the individualised treatment approach.

    • Summary of the week

      This activity gives you a brief summary of what you have learnt this week.

  • Week 3

    Application of Chinese Medicine in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Pain

    • Introduction to Chinese medicine

      This activity gives you an overview of Chinese medicine.

    • Holism of pain management & pattern identification

      This activity explains how the two key notions in Chinese medicine -holism and pattern identification can be applied in pain management.

    • Chinese medicine treatment for pain

      This activity presents various Chinese medicine treatments and its principles in pain management.

    • Summary of the week

      This activity gives you a brief summary of what you have learnt this week.

  • Week 4

    Pain Management: Role of Combined Chinese/Western Medicine Approaches

    • An overview on pain management

      This activity introduces the role of combined Chinese/Western medicine approaches.

    • Western medicine in pain management

      This activity defines the notion of pain from a Western medicine perspective and introduces different treatment approaches in Western medicine.

    • Chinese medicine in pain management

      This activity presents the roles of Chinese medicine in pain management, the safety of the complementary approach and effectiveness of acupuncture.

    • Integrated Chinese medicine pain clinic (IPC)

      This activity gives you some brief information of the IPC and its operation.

    • Summary of the week

      This activity gives you a brief summary of what you have learnt this week.

When would you like to start?

Start straight away and join a global classroom of learners. If the course hasn’t started yet you’ll see the future date listed below.

  • Available now

Learning on this course

On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

  • Explain what pain is from the perspective of Chinese and Western medicines
  • Explain the basic knowledge of the pain diagnosis and treatment
  • Evaluate the significance of integrative pain management with Chinese and Western medicines

Who is the course for?

This course is designed for Western medical professionals such as pain medicine specialists, general practitioners, physiotherapists, psychologists, and nurses.

It may also be useful for Chinese medicine practitioners who are interested in integrative pain management.

Who will you learn with?

Dr TUNG Shong Jenny is Associate Head of College of Life Sciences and Technology, HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education.

Dr Steven Wong is the President of The Hong Kong Pain Society. He is the Consultant Anaesthesiologist of the Department of Anaesthesiology at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Hong Kong.

Dr ZHOU Jiefang is an Honorary Associate Professor at the HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education.

I am an clinical oncologist working in Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Hong Kong, with great interest in management of lung cancer, palliative medicine and cancer pain.

Consultant Anaesthesiologist & Director of Pain Management Centre of Kwong Wah Hospital.

Who developed the course?

HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education

In fulfilling the mission of The University of Hong Kong in extending lifelong learning opportunities for the community, HKU SPACE aspires to be a world-class centre of excellence.

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Ways to learn

Choose the best way to learn for you!

Subscribe & save

$27.99

For the first two months. Automatically renews

Develop skills to further your career

  • Access to this course
  • Access to 1,000+ courses
  • Learn at your own pace
  • Discuss your learning in comments
  • Digital certificate when you're eligible

Cancel for free anytime

Buy this course

$134/one-off payment

Fulfill your current learning need

  • Access to this course
  • Learn at your own pace
  • Discuss your learning in comments
  • Printed and digital certificate when you’re eligible

Limited access

Free

Sample the course materials

  • Access expires 1 Jun 2024

Find out more about certificates, Unlimited or buying a course (Upgrades)

Sale price available until 5 May 2024 at 23:59 (UTC). T&Cs apply.

Find out more about certificates, Unlimited or buying a course (Upgrades)

Sale price available until 5 May 2024 at 23:59 (UTC). T&Cs apply.

Learning on FutureLearn

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  • Courses are split into weeks, activities, and steps to help you keep track of your learning
  • Learn through a mix of bite-sized videos, long- and short-form articles, audio, and practical activities
  • Stay motivated by using the Progress page to keep track of your step completion and assessment scores

Join a global classroom

  • Experience the power of social learning, and get inspired by an international network of learners
  • Share ideas with your peers and course educators on every step of the course
  • Join the conversation by reading, @ing, liking, bookmarking, and replying to comments from others

Map your progress

  • As you work through the course, use notifications and the Progress page to guide your learning
  • Whenever you’re ready, mark each step as complete, you’re in control
  • Complete 90% of course steps and all of the assessments to earn your certificate

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