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About Dr. Brenda Lau

I am a pain physician, anesthesiologist and hypnotherapist. Medical Director of Changepain Medical and Allied Health Clinic, and Clinical Professor at the University of British Columbia.

Twenty five years of medicine, and fifty two years of living. I have never been able to separate the doctor from the woman, and I stopped trying.

I grew up in poverty, in a family coming apart

under the weight of pain and silence.

I was seven when I decided the violence would stop with me.

I did not have a plan. I had a promise.

Education was the door out. I walked through it and I kept walking, and three decades later, when I named my clinic Changepain, I was saying that same promise out loud in a language the world could hear.

THEN I BECAME THE PATIENT...

Metastatic thyroid cancer. The complications that followed took my voice for three months.

Three months. It could have been the rest of my life.

But it did not stop there. Eight years later, a large pelvic tumour that took major surgery. Osteoporosis in my early forties. Menopause, with no one to guide me through it.

I refused the passive approach. I combined medical science with mind and body work, and my recovery was never one moment of victory. It was hundreds of small ones, each of them a decision to move when it would have been easier not to.

I know what it is to sit in that chair and be told to rest and wait. I know what it is to be the most medically informed person in the room and still feel the ground go.

That is the part you cannot learn in training. I did not choose it, but I do not waste it.

My wisdom was earned in the valleys. Every summit I have crossed left scars from fires faced, and each one made me more determined. Grit and persistence are earned, and they are trainable.

Building systems that work

For 25 years I Have Worked to Reshape How Pain Care is Delivered in Canada

  • Co-founded Canada's first medical subspecialty in Pain Medicine

  • Led the establishment of the UBC Pain Medicine Residency program, across multiple training sites

  • Built multidisciplinary clinics, including Changepain Medical and Allied Health Clinic, which has served 70,000+ patients

  • Led work on patient care policy, specialist qualification and clinic safety standards

None of it appeared overnight. It came from decades of learning and testing, and from never accepting that this is simply how things are.

Every programme, clinic and policy I have helped build rests on one principle: when people are seen and equipped with knowledge, everything works better.

Understanding is not the same as being able to act.

Plenty of people can explain what is happening in your body. Being heard feels good in the room. But if you walk out with validation and nothing to use, you are still stuck. I blend medical science with lived experience, mine and that of the women I work with. In practice that takes three forms, and I do not stop at the first one.

I TRANSLATE

I turn medical information into language that means something, and connect fragmented findings so you can see the bigger picture instead of a list. Healing starts with understanding your symptoms, your patterns, and their root causes.

I NAVIGATE

The system is overwhelming, and most women get stuck not because they lack motivation but because nobody gave them a map. I teach you how to work with your doctors, advocate for yourself, and move through the barriers instead of burning out on them.

I ACTIVATE

Knowledge only counts once it is used. I help you turn understanding into decisions that rebuild energy, capacity and trust in your own body. I hand you the skill, not the reassurance.

Ways I can help

Start Where You Are

Available now

Start Here: 4-Week Foundation

A focused guide and video series I built around four pillars: mind, movement, sleep and nutrition. This is for you if you know something needs to change and you do not know where to begin.

14.99 USD, ONE TIME

Opening soon

Coaching 1:1

Private sessions where I help you translate what is happening in your body, navigate the system around you, and guide the questions to clarify your next steps. I keep a limited number of hours each month.

Waitlist open

COMING OCTOBER 2026

Becoming Unstuck

Whole-woman wisdom from a physician’s life quest. Four parts, more than 30 video sessions, each with a tool and a practical daily action, the same ones I use in my own life and share with my patients too. I paid for these lessons with cancer, a lost voice, thin bones, poverty and hundred-hour weeks. Now they are yours.

Waitlist open

"When one woman paves her path, it opens the way for thousands."

The content on this site is for general education and is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. It does not create a physician and patient relationship. Always speak with your own physician or qualified health provider about your individual situation.

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