Rachael’s miraculous recovery takes her from palliative care to opening a new facility, thanks to specialist pain management device
A Plymouth patient has made a miraculous recovery as a result of receiving a rare highly specialist implant to control her pain for cancer care.
In 2023 Rachael Johnson was diagnosed with a large stage 4 tumour in her colon and was losing weight rapidly. After spending eight weeks receiving palliative care from St Lukes, things weren’t looking hopeful.
“I felt absolutely awful. I was so weak. All I could do was lay there. The morphine and ketamine they were giving me just wasn’t doing anything to control the pain, and my body wasn’t coping,” explains Rachael.
Thankfully Rachael was referred to the Chronic Pain Management Services team at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust (UHP) and that sparked the start of her amazing journey to recovery.
“When I met Dr Bagchi, I was told about an intrathecal pain pump that can help to control pain,” Rachael adds. “I was in absolute agony - I couldn’t eat, sleep or even talk, so although the surgical procedure to insert it into the base of your spine sounded scary, everything was just so bad that I just said yes to having it done.
“It took a little while to work, but then just like that, I was out of pain and suddenly I was able to cope with my cancer treatment. Believe it or not, a couple years later and now the tumour has vanished. We’re hoping that in 2029 I’ll be cancer-free and the pain pump can be removed.”
Rachael’s mum Suzie cannot praise the support her daughter received enough: “It’s absolutely revolutionised Rachael’s life, and mine. Watching your own daughter in so much pain is just awful. But I was shocked at just how much of a difference pain management can make in keeping someone alive. Rachael’s pain went from 100% to almost completely nothing. Once her pain was under control, it helped her to focus on her recovery from cancer. I honestly don’t think she would have recovered without the help she received from the team. You cannot fault them, they really look after you here.”
Rachael, who lives locally in Plymouth, was invited to cut the ribbon at an official ceremony to mark the opening UHP’s Chronic Pain Management Service in its new home. The team have recently moved into a newly refurbished space at Plymouth Marjon University, following a collaboration between the two organisations. The purpose-designed facility nine clinic rooms, a dedicated group therapy space and access to an on-site gym, enabling the team to deliver a broader range of pain management approaches. It marks an exciting new chapter for the service and the patients it supports.
Lindsey Pollard, Nurse Consultant at UHP said: “There aren’t many centres in the UK that are able to provide this specialist device for palliative care cancer patients. Having provided 25 of these pain pumps to patients this year alone, we are in fact the biggest implanter in the country. Thanks to Dr Bagchi’s expertise, and our close-working relationship with neurosurgery, we are glad that we are able to offer this rare pain management solution to our patients.
“It makes a massive difference. The pump itself is able to deliver medication that is 300 times more potent, allowing us to deliver significantly lower doses of the drug, obtaining pain relief without the side-effects that are often associated by morphine-based drugs when taken by mouth or a patch. It enables patients living with a palliative cancer diagnosis to have a much greater quality of life - some have gone from hospice care to being able to go back on holiday, ride horses and even drive tractors to work on a farm.
“At the end of the day, life is not about surviving, it is about living.”
Find out more about the Chronic Pain Management Service and their new location.
