Join Emma Karran in discussing One Thing she wants people challenged by pain to know. Is pain the same everywhere? Explore the current state of pain science research and clinical practice in this straight-to-the-point interview with Emma.
About Emma Karran
Dr Emma Karren is a physiotherapist and Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the University of South Australia. Emma’s current projects and interests relate to exploring the social determinants of pain outcomes, optimising the management of low back pain in primary care, implementation research, and health communication. Find out more about Emma here.
Transcript
MILLIE: What is one thing you want people challenged by persistent pain to know?
EMMA: Thanks Millie, if I have to pick one thing, it’s that both within countries and between countries, there are really big differences in people’s opportunities to lead healthy lives, and many of these differences are avoidable.
When we think about what makes someone healthy or reasons why someone experiences persistent pain, we often think about their health behaviours, possibly their diet or their exercise habits, maybe their genetics or their access to and use of healthcare services. But whether someone is healthy or not, is importantly influenced by the social determinants of health.
These are the factors such as a person’s income and social status, their educational level, the characteristics of their home or work environment, or even their neighbourhood, maybe their race, their gender, or their social support network. These are the conditions in which people grow, live, work, and age, and they’re really important determinants of a person’s experience of persistent pain and their chances of recovering well.
MILLIE: So for people that do have persistent pain and might be thinking, oh, these are just factors that are sort of out of my control, and can’t do much to help or address, why is it important that we consider the social determinants of health in pain management specifically?
EMMA: Understanding the role of the social determinants of health is really important for all public health problems because it recognizes that not all of society is burdened equally, and it also requires need for concerted efforts to try and even out these differences.
The unequal experiences of persistent pain arise for lots of reasons. However, when these differences are avoidable and when they’re also unfair and unjust, they’re referred to as health inequities. The Public health field talks about improving health equity by taking action on the social determinants of health. This primarily involves making changes at the level of government policy and systems, but action to reduce health inequities can also happen in clinical settings and through interventions that aim to address the health of the communities in which people live.
MILLIE: Beautiful. So can you tell me a little bit more specifically about your research and where that’s heading to, I guess investigate the social determinants of health in pain a little better.
EMMA: Sure. I think that recognizing and addressing health inequities is a really important direction for the pain field at the moment. One of the crucial things that will facilitate this is routinely collecting a comprehensive range of equity relevant data in pain studies. My current work is leading a large global community of researchers, patient partners, and key stakeholders to reach agreement on a minimum data set for the collection data relevant to the social determinants of health that we hope will be broadly implemented into all human pain research.
MILLIE: Beautiful. Well, all the best with your research. Can’t wait to hear more about it in the future and what your findings will be. Thank you so much for joining us at one thing.
EMMA: Thanks, Millie.