Shirley Otis-Green, M.S.W., L.C.S.W., has been selected to participate in the 2006-7 Mayday Pain & Society Fellowship, making her the first to represent City of Hope in the unique program.

The Mayday Fund — a charitable foundation dedicated to social and medical causes — supports the fellowship, which focuses on pain management. Otis-Green is one of six health professionals selected for the honor this year. Only two of the 18 national fellows in the program’s history are social workers; the others are physicians, psychologists and nursing researchers.

“This fellowship is only possible because of the mentoring and support I’ve received from Marcia Grant and Betty Ferrell,” Otis-Green said, referring to the Department of Nursing Research and Education’s well-known leaders and experts in quality of life and pain management.

The fellowship provides specialists in pain management with tools and skills to advocate for better pain treatment. Fellows learn how to communicate with the media and policymakers to raise visibility for the importance of pain management.

“During the fellowship, we’ll be mentored by faculty members and will learn how to talk about these issues in a way that everyone can understand, so legislators and the media themselves can better communicate about pain and end-of-life issues to the public,” she said.

Fellows will gather at a workshop in Washington, D.C., where they will learn how to connect with media, write newspaper editorials and develop relationships with government-relations leaders and legislators.

The Mayday Fund was established in 1992, with treatment of pain at the core of the organization’s mission.