Study participant characteristics.
| Characteristic | Participants (n = 16) |
|---|---|
| Age in years; mean (SD) | 60.4 (10.4)* |
| Sex at birth; n (%) | |
| Female | 12 (75%) |
| Male | 4 (25%) |
| Race; n (%) | |
| White | 15 (93.7%) |
| American Indian or Alaska Native | 1 (6.3%) |
| Ethnicity; n (%) | |
| Non-Hispanic/Latino(a) | 15 (93.7%) |
| Hispanic/Latino(a) | 1 (6.3%) |
| Ethnicity; n (%) | |
| Married | 4 (25%) |
| Never married | 4 (25%) |
| Widowed | 4 (25%) |
| Divorced | 2 (12.5%) |
| Living with partner | 2 (12.5%) |
| Highest education level; n (%) | |
| Graduate degree | 8 (50%) |
| AA of technician certification | 4 (25%) |
| Bachelor’s degree | 2 (12.5%) |
| Some college | 1 (6.3%) |
| High school diploma or general educational development test | 1 (6.3%) |
| Employment status; n (%) | |
| Disabled | 8 (50%) |
| Retired | 6 (37.5%) |
| Part-time | 2 (12.5%) |
| Insurance coverage; n (%) | |
| Medicare | 9 (56.2%) |
| Private | 4 (25%) |
| Medicaid/State | 2 (12.5%) |
| Veterans administration | 1 (6.3) |
| Mental health disorder diagnosis; n (%) | 7 (43.8%) |
| Number of pain conditions; mean (SD) | 4.5 (1.8) |
| Number of pain conditions; n (%) | |
| 2 or less | 2 (12.5%) |
| 3 | 3 (18.8%) |
| 4 | 2 (12.5%) |
| 5 or more | 9 (56.2%) |
| Pain conditions; n (%) | |
| Back pain | 16 (100%) |
| Arthritis | 12 (75%) |
| Nerve pain | 12 (75%) |
| Neck pain | 10 (62.5%) |
| Headache/Migraines | 8 (50%) |
| Post-surgical | 5 (31.3%) |
| Other | 4 (25%) |
| Fibromyalgia | 3 (18.8%) |
| CRPS/RSD | 2 (12.5%) |
*: Age range: 37 years (low: 38 years of age; high: 75 years of age). CRPS: complex regional pain syndrome; RSD: reflex sympathetic dystrophy; SD: standard deviation.
The authors wish to acknowledge the participants who made this work possible, along with contributions in planning, recruitment, and clinical expertise from our partners in Spokane, WA including medical director Dr. Jamie Lewis and colleagues at Northwest Spine and Pain Medicine, project manager Heidi Wilson and colleagues at Spokane Regional Opioid Task Force Non-opioid Pain Management Work Group and Spokane Regional Health District, and the medical professionals at CHAS Health. We also are indebted to the skilled practitioners who contributed in planning and administering telehealth consultations, including Kelli Pearson, DC, DeeDee Hoover, LMT, Earl J. Duenas, LMT, and Gianna M. (Bardelli) Bean, E-RYT, YACEP.
MW: Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology, Data curation, Funding acquisition, Visualization, Writing—original draft, Writing—review & editing. DUE: Data curation, Writing—original draft, Writing—review & editing. RJB: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Methodology, Visualization, Writing—original draft, Writing—review & editing. SVB: Conceptualization, Data curation, Writing—review & editing. DM: Conceptualization, Data curation, Writing—review & editing. All authors read and approved the submitted version.
The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
The COMFORT study was registered a priori through Clinical Trials Network (#NCT05098158) and approved by the Washington State University Institutional Review Board (IRB #18111). This manuscript complies with the Declaration of Helsinki.
Informed consent to participation in the study was obtained from all participants.
Informed consent to publication was obtained from all participants.
The datasets generated and analyzed for this study can be shared upon reasonable request made via email to the principal investigator/corresponding author.
Research reported in this publication was funded by the Rayce Rudeen Foundation and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health [UL1 TR002319]. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the affiliations, funding agency, or the National Institutes of Health. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
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