The Effect of Pain Education on Multidisciplinary Healthcare Students' Understanding of Chronic Pain

NCT ID: NCT03710837

Last Updated: 2020-03-23

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 37 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2018-10-01
• Study Completion Date: 2019-10-15

Brief Summary

Chronic pain is the leading cause of disability worldwide affecting just under 28 million people in the UK. Chronic pain conditions require a biopsychosocial rather than a biomedical model of care. Biomedical management lacks evidence of effectiveness but also has the potential to exacerbate the condition by raising fears and anxiety about potential pathological abnormalities.

Healthcare professionals often hold negative beliefs about people with chronic pain and view the condition within a biomedical framework. These negative attitudes can be observed at the pre-registration training stage of the health professionals' career. Thus, the pre-registration phase is an important point where an individual's understanding of, and beliefs about, pain and people with pain may be shaped for the future. The need for improved and better education of healthcare professionals to support best practice for low back pain with the aim of integrating professionals' management of low back pain and fostering innovation in practice is well recognised. This study seeks to quantify the benefits of pain education in knowledge, attitudes and beliefs. The findings may encourage other pre-registration institutions to deliver pain education in a more directed way and simultaneously support the International Association for the Study of Pain's (IASP) proposed integration pain education into existing curriculum.

Detailed Description

In 2011 Briggs et al described pain education at undergraduate level for healthcare professionals as 'woefully inadequate'. Pain Neurophysiology Education (PNE) can improve undergraduates' pain understanding/management, however previous RCTs used single discipline groups and immediate follow-up. Investigation of the effectiveness of this education on students across the multi-professional team with medium-to-long-term follow-up will provide important new information on the generalisability of existing data and whether or not any changes in pain understanding/management are maintained over time.

This study aims to contribute to the development of neuromusculoskeletal physiotherapy by identifying whether or not this education, which aims to up skill healthcare professionals of the future, is effective and can change their behaviours in practice to enhance patient care in chronic pain management. PNE has been shown to be useful in patient care in conjunction with other treatment methods. If this intervention is successful in altering pain attitudes and knowledge in keeping with modern science then students may feel more confident and able to manage pain post qualification. The findings of this study will support or refute the addition of PNE into healthcare professional undergraduate programmes.

Conditions

Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
• Blinding Strategy: TRIPLE

Study Groups

Pain neuroscience education

Intervention: Pain neuroscience education group. One-off, 70 minute duration session delivered by Dr Cormac Ryan.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Pain neuroscience education

Intervention Type: OTHER

Two different lectures covering essential clinical skills but one designed to explore the hypothesis

Red flag education

Intervention: Red flags education group. One-off 70 minute duration session delivered by Dr Cormac Ryan.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Red flag education

Intervention Type: OTHER

Two different lectures covering essential clinical skills but one designed to explore the hypothesis

Interventions

Pain neuroscience education

Two different lectures covering essential clinical skills but one designed to explore the hypothesis

Intervention Type: OTHER

Red flag education

Two different lectures covering essential clinical skills but one designed to explore the hypothesis

Intervention Type: OTHER

Other Intervention Names

Red flag education; Pain neuroscience education

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Pre-registration student at Teesside University in one of following six disciplines: paramedics, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, midwifery, nursing, diagnostic radiography.

Exclusion Criteria

• Disciplines other than those listed above

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

Teesside University

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Mrs Jagjit Mankelow

Principal Investigator

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

Denis Martin, PhD

Role: STUDY_DIRECTOR

Professor at Teesside University

Locations

Teesside University

Middlesbrough, , United Kingdom

Countries

United Kingdom

Other Identifiers

095/18

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id