Light up in Teal 2022/2023 Campaign Updates
Melbourne Awareness Weekend 2023
Members of the committee and other volunteers from all around the country headed to our Melbourne Awareness Weekend 2023 to meet up with James Hermans to collect our sets of Q Magnets, attend the One Night in Cairo fund raising dance festival, host a volunteer workshop and attend the Melbourne support group meeting. It was…
Light Up In Teal 2023
October is Facial Pain Awareness month and specifically for our association October 7th is International Trigeminal Neuralgia Awareness Day where organisations from across the world request cities to Light up in Teal 2023 a significant building to highlight the struggles people living with TN endure. It is a slow process contacting city councils to try…
The Power of Story Telling
Our Association has been operating as a charity for 20 years. Sometimes in the busyness of volunteering, it is easy to lose sight of the good we do for our community and the power of story telling This experience has been supplied by Jo Holland who has given us permission to publish in order for…
Sticks and Stones – The Psychology
The following article explores the effect words can have on a person and the how it can impact pain levels. Sticks and Stones – Previous article exploring the subject Psychology Today E. Paul Zehr Ph.D. Black Belt Brain Sticks and Stones Break Your Bones but Words Hurt Your Brain There’s overlap in how the brain…
Members Story – Dee Grant
Thank you Dee for sharing providing your members story, each one helps our community. I thought you might like to share my journey with other members. I could go into further depth if you want as I must say some said it was caused by MS lesions and others said it was from the TMJ……
Disability Support Pension – the process
The diagnosis of trigeminal neuralgia is a day people living with the condition will always remember and when they may have to consider a disability support pension. Prior to the diagnosis each person would have gone through extreme pain, confusion, misdiagnosis, disbelief, isolation, mental health breakdown, extreme anxiety, loss of hope and isolation. Then you…
Diagnosing and treating persistent orofacial pain
Continuing our conversations around diagnosing and treating persistent orofacial pain, the following article explains the new classifications for dental pain and the people behind the changes. Professor Chris Peck is a senior transformative leader who, as a leader of a major University initiative and Dean of Faculty, has developed and delivered innovative and sustainable University-…
Podcast A/Prof Tasha Stanton
We are delighted to announce that Ass Prof Tasha Stanton has accepted our invitation to present webinar for our community. She has an extremely busy schedule but we have preliminary booked February 7th 2024. The below podcast will help you understand her work. Wednesday Aug 30, 2023 Episode 36 – Tasha Stanton (Relaunch) – Illusions…
President’s Reflections – Oct 2023
Hello everyone I hope you enjoy this edition of my ‘President’s Reflections’. National Support Line During the past month, I have accumulated 347minutes of support time on the National Support Help Line for people living with TN. Support Group Leader Meeting I held our first support group leader meeting for the year, via Zoom 08/09/2023,…
Self Compassion and Self Expression in the Arts
With our October Dance Festival awareness event just around the corner, this podcast exploring how artists living with chronic pain, organise their performances around their limitations is very relevant. Is self-compassion a trait or a state of being? This edition is inspired by findings that suggest stronger self-compassion is associated with reduced impact of chronic pain. Self-compassion, in this…
Regional Care And Chronic Pain
Australia is a vast and beautiful country, but for those who need Regional care coping with chronic pain, accessing appropriate medical care poses huge challenges. The following article covers the subject in depth. Rural patients deserve better health care. We just need to be brave and implement change. By Jack Archer – Posted Thu 23 Mar 2023…
Mikala Grosse is Raising Awareness
One of our members Mikala Grosse is raising awareness for people living with trigeminal neuralgia at an event in Hobart – see details below. If you are interested in attending please use this link Event description With International Trigeminal Neuralgia Awareness Day coming up on 7th October, Mikala Grosse will join WNA members and friends to…
Patients Storytelling
Many in our community tell stories of visits to their doctors and dentists, where they felt they weren’t listened too. Research has shown that it can take as little as 11 seconds for a patient to be interrupted by a medical professional, which impacts how our stories are heard. Very often the medical professional, which…
TNAA Website – How to Videos
The TNAA Website has now been in operation for 20 months. We strive to ensure our users and members understand how to access our content rich platform. In order to provide easy to follow instructions we are using short videos to guide you. Our videos are posted to our You Tube Channel How to submit…
TNAA Collaboration with Q Magnets in a Pain Management Trial
Our Association has been in consultation with James Hermans, the Managing Director of Q Magnets to offer an exciting opportunity for our members. “TNAA Collaboration with Q Magnets in a pain management trial”. Although there has been research covering the effectiveness of magnets to help reduce pain, it is extremely difficult to set up clinical trials…
Pain Australia Resources
Pain Australia posts great resources on their website. The resources include fact sheets that they produce and from other organisations. These fact sheets are not only useful to our community but can also act as a training tool for family members or work colleague, who often have never heard the words trigeminal neuralgia. Often they…
Understanding Pain Theory
The following paper covers various Pain Theory Models. It is interesting to see how modern medicine derives it’s knowledge and how these theories are applied in practice. This specific theory of pain hypothesizes that pain is the result of complex interactions between biological, psychological, and sociological factors, and any theory which fails to include all…
President’s Reflections – Sep 2023
The months are passing so quickly – we will soon be into spring and hopefully those cold winter winds will be less troublesome. We have been working hard on plenty of projects including Light Up In Teal, The Dance Festival, Webinars and our SGL Workshop. National Support Line During the past month, I have accumulated…
Support Group Event – Melbourne
Sometimes it is hard to convince people who are newly diagnosed with trigeminal neuralgia, to attend a support group event or meeting. They may have misgivings that the information they receive has no value, after extensively researching Dr Google. They may feel self conscious speaking in front of others. They may feel so isolated and…
Measuring Success
As a volunteer charity with limited funds and even more limited people power, how can we be measuring success in the trigeminal neuralgia awareness space? Big business has data analysis departments to measure interaction, web traffic user engagement etc. This analysis can drive efficiency, provide audience evaluation, drivers to improve user investment and even financial…
