Women In Pain Conference: Gender Matters Duarte, CA – May 30, 2008

If you live in near Duarte, California and are interested in learning more about women and chronic pain, I have something for you.

Cynthia Toussaint is the founder and spokesperson at For Grace, a nonprofit organization that works to ensure the ethical and equal treatment of all women in pain.

At the age of 21, as a ballerina (25 years ago) a minor ballet injury triggered the chronic pain disease, Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD), as she says, also known as the Suicide Disease.  RSD is more commonly referred to now as complex regional pain syndrome, or CRPS. For the first 13 years, her doctors told her that her physical problems were all in her head.  That abuse and neglect left her bedridden for a decade – and unable to speak for five years while the disease ravaged her vocal cords and the rest of her body.

Today, from her wheelchair, she’s writing her memoir and preparing for her Inaugural Women In Pain Conference: Gender Matters.  To host this groundbreaking event, she is partnering with the Southern California Cancer Pain Initiative and City of Hope. It is not to late to register!

The keynote speakers are:

• Mary Bennett, MFA, American Pain Foundation “Call to Action to Improve the Lives of Women in Pain ”
• Diane Hoffmann, JD, MS, Director of Law & Health Care  “The Disparity Toward Women in Pain”
• Judy Paice, PhD, RN, FAAN, President, American Pain Society “Gender Differences in Clinical Treatment of Pain”

Here is the agenda.

And, here is the press release that discusses the conference.

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