Abstract
BackgroundChronic pain is highly prevalent in the working population. People tend to attempt self-initiated treatments to manage their pain. The self-efficacy of behavioural change is a suitable model for guiding the development of an electronic pain management programme (ePain). The aim in this study is to develop ePain and to evaluate its effectiveness at improving pain self-efficacy, reducing pain intensity and negative emotions, and increasing quality of life.MethodsThis study will be a randomized controlled trial. ePain will take the form of a 6-week online pain management programme. Participants will be aged 15 years or above, have chronic pain, and be employed. They must complete the baseline questionnaire and will be randomized into intervention and control groups. They will receive notifications to encourage their participation in ePain and complete the evaluation questionnaires. They will complete the process evaluation at week 3, the post assessment at week 6, and the follow-up assessment at week 12. The study will focus on pain self-efficacy; pain situations; negative emotions including levels of depression, anxiety, and stress; and quality of life. The participants’ opinions of ePain will be collected as feedback. Data will be analysed on an intention-to-treat basis and generalized estimating equations will be used to investigate the time-averaged difference and differences at each follow-up time.DiscussionThe study will provide information about the pain situations of online users in the working population. The participants will benefit from improvements in pain self-efficacy, pain situations, emotional status, and quality of life. The study will illustrate whether online learning is an effective intervention for improving the pain self-efficacy of the working population.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov, NCT03718702. Registered on 23 October 2018.
Highlights
Chronic pain is highly prevalent in the working population
The working population comprises the largest portion of people in Hong Kong society and is defined as adults aged from 15 to 64 years [1]
Pain is highly prevalent in the Hong Kong population
Summary
Chronic pain is highly prevalent in the working population. The working population comprises the largest portion of people in Hong Kong society and is defined as adults aged from 15 to 64 years [1]. This group of people helps society to function. Studies have revealed that the prevalence of chronic pain ranges from 34.9% to 87.4%, and is high in people aged 18–64 years [4,5,6]. The prevalence of pain is reportedly 19% in the United States and 24.9% in Germany with mild intensity [7, 8], levels that are far below that in Hong Kong
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