When Helen Culleton began treatment for lung cancer in 2020, she thought the diagnosis would be a “blip in the road”. Due to the genetic nature of her cancer, and the way in which it spread to her hip and her brain, her treatment was not the most typical.
She underwent surgery to remove the left upper lobe of her left lung, but five years later, the scar tissue continues to cause her “horrific pain”.
“Because I have internal scarring, I need to get injections to numb it,” says the 59-year-old Dubliner.
“That way, when the internal organs hit off the scar, there wouldn’t be pain, so [that] I could have the full range of movement. I can’t sleep on my back ... I can’t sleep on my side, because it felt like an avalanche of movement.”
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Because of this, receiving these injections is crucial for her quality of life. When she was receiving them in St James’s Hospital, however, pressures on the hospital sometimes meant appointments for pain relief were delayed or postponed.
“The hospital was firefighting, but I felt like I had to accommodate people ahead of me. I felt like I didn’t have a voice to advocate for myself. In March 2024, I couldn’t get my injection because the day ward was being used as an overflow for the emergency department,” she says.
“That was a tough time ... I felt I was getting a raw deal.”
Thankfully, she says, things have improved since the opening of the Health Service Executive’s Mount Carmel surgical hub in South Dublin last February.
The hub deals with planned procedures and those that do not require hospital stays, to treat 10,000 day cases and minor surgeries annually. The specialities being treated there include pain management, plastics, orthopaedics, breast surgery, colorectal surgery and dermatology.
A Mount Carmel spokeswoman said the hub is operating at 70 per cent capacity, while some instruments and equipment still need to be delivered to cater for additional specialities.
Áine O’Gara, a consultant in pain medicine and anaesthesia at St James’s and Mount Carmel, says chronic pain affects every aspect of life, from the ability to look after oneself to being able to work.
She adds that the prevalence of chronic pain will increase in the coming decades as the State’s population continues to age, with it affecting about one in three adults.
“We needed an avenue for patients to get straightforward procedures – like chronic pain management – done. The problem with these things being done in an acute hospital setting is [that] they are extremely busy with acute work,” she says.
“An unfortunate consequence when there are surges of Covid or, more recently, flu, is [that] elective procedures or chronic pain management can get put on the long finger. So this provides much more balanced care because patients have easier access and more realistic time frames.”
The most recent waiting list figures from the National Treatment Purchase Fund show there were 114 people on a list for pain relief at St James’s Hospital in August 2025, down from 342 in the same month last year.
Ms Culleton says she will never hear the words “you’re all clear” in relation to her cancer, but insists her story is one of hope, particularly since she now has more guaranteed access to pain relief.
“Previously, I had appointments delayed by hours because there was so much urgent care. Because St James’s is an acute hospital, everyone is dashing around. Now, in Mount Carmel, it’s so calm and you know you’re actually going to be seen.”
