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We are living longer. Later life for many will be characterized by learning to live with pain, and how to live well despite pain. Theories of adjustment are reviewed with a focus on the dual process model of coping, which puts all attempts at coping with adversity within in a developmental and ageing framework. Examples of how one comes to negotiate what is possible, desirable, achievable, and allowable in later life occupation are explored. Finally, a consideration of this new age is discussed with its implications for identity and for social change.

Millennials, born from 1980 onwards, may differ in important ways from previous generations. Differences have been explored in personality and occupational psychology, but largely ignored in medical and clinical psychology. Chronic pain, which peaks in incidence during puberty, can have negative effects on adolescents socially, emotionally, and physically. If unresolved, it may persist into adulthood, limiting opportunities. This brings challenges in understanding what it means to have chronic pain as a millennial and how this impacts on expectations and actions. In this chapter, we explore what we know from research on the millennial generation, including how millennials engage with work and with health care, and how an understanding of millennial generational features can help us determine how young people cope with pain. Finally, we consider what it means to be a millennial health-care provider, all within a generational framework.

This chapter sets out how the book achieves its aim of providing an authoritative, thought-provoking analysis of the relationship between all forms of occupation (school, employment, later life production) and pain. We begin with a brief introduction to why this aim is important, and show what a consideration of work and pain can offer. We introduce our life-span approach and scope of the book, covering Foundations (what is work, what is pain, how do they link), Investigations (into the interactions between pain and family life, learning, emerging adulthood, the occupational health workforce, and later life), and Interventions (from psychological, workplace, and policy-making perspectives). We signpost readers to our Discussion in which we bring together the book’s findings in a conceptual and analytical map of the forces of change in work, occupation, and pain management to suggest future ways of thinking about policy, practice, and research agendas.

There are over 740 million people living in the 37 countries who are members of the European Pain Federation of chapters of the International Association for the Study of Pain. The editors introduce the field of pain management, in particular the work of over 20,000 people in acute (largely injury related) pain, chronic pain including cancer pain management, and palliative care. We then describe how the book European Pain Management is structured. There are three sections: an introduction to the world of pain and the epidemiology of pain. The main section, which is 37 chapters long, reports describing the practice of pain management in each country, the challenges and innovations. And a final section looks at specific issues that cut across all nations, and ends with a concluding analysis of the statue of European Pain Management.

In this final chapter of European Pain Management the editors summarize what has been learned from taking stock of the experiences in the 37 countries. There are common issues, such as the need to keep pace with the change in demand as demographics change, the requirements for creating specialty status in pain management, and the need to update and innovate with new methods and new science, and the challenges of working within different policy requirements, especially in regard to the control of medicines. There are examples of innovation in practice in all countries. Finally, we discuss the need for greater planning across Europe in order to innovate novel, sustainable models of the organization and delivery of care.