PodChatLive is the weekly livestream for the ongoing professional development of Podiatry practitioners together with other health professionals that will be thinking about all the different topics that they covers. It is hosted by Craig Payne from Melbourne, Australia and Ian Griffiths from England, United Kingdom. The stream goes out live on Facebook and then is later submitted to YouTube. Each live episode has a different person or collection of guests to go over a unique area of interest each time. Questions have been answered live by the hosts and their guests during the livestream on Facebook. Additionally there is a PodCast recording of each episode located on iTunes and Spotify and the other common podcast providers. They’ve gained a considerable following which is certainly growing. The livestream may be considered one of the methods in which podiatrists might get complimentary professional development hours.
In episode 8, they discussed the developments in the pain sciences and also the complexity of pain with the physical therapist and pain instructor, Mike Stewart. It became apparent that it is vital for all health professionals need to understand pain better than they have in the past and podiatrists have to get the skills to successfully convey this to their patients. The discussion concluded that pain is really a individual encounter. It is deemed an output of the mind as a result of real or understood threat that has the purpose of protecting us and getting us to alter our behaviour. Pain is contextual and is affected by a lot of factors. Mike Stewart is a physical therapist that functions as a Spinal Clinical Specialist for East Kent Hospitals University Foundation NHS Trust in the United Kingdom. Mike works full-time as a physiotherapist with over 15 years of expertise dealing with complex, persistent pain disorders. Furthermore, he is a committed practice-based mentor focused on offering evidence-based education and learning to a wide selection of health care professionals, such as podiatrists. He is currently undertaking an MSc in Clinical Education at the University of Brighton in the UK. He runs the Know Pain programs around the world.