Poster Presentation Sydney Spinal Symposium 2025

Laying the foundations for a co-designed community pain education campaign in rural Australia: the EQUiPP Project. (#41)

Louise K Wiles 1 , Aaron Davis 2 , Hayley Leake 1 , Ashley Grant 1 , Ian Gwilt 2 , Oliver Davis 1 , Lorimer Moseley 1
  1. IIMPACT in Health, University of South Australia, Kaurna Country, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
  2. UniSA Creative, University of South Australia, Kaurna Country, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia

Background:

One in five Australians experience chronic pain, conveying a large health burden and reduced productivity for individuals, families and communities. Education is recommended internationally as first-line care for chronic pain; however access is often limited, particularly in rural areas. The National Pain Action Plan identifies community-level education and capacity building as a priority, but our previous work has shown that public health initiatives designed and delivered without community partnerships risk increasing health inequities.

 

Aims:

The aims of this study were:

  1. To locate and engage with rural communities and interest-holders who had identified chronic pain care as a need.
  2. To understand how people in these areas access health information.

 

Methods:

To identify communities with shared needs we consulted the Australian Atlas of Healthcare Variation, and then engaged high-variation Primary and Local Health Networks (PHNs, LHNs) to understand their needs analyses and action plans. Next, we partnered with the Western Victoria PHN and Limestone Coast (SA) LHN to build capacity through Pain Revolution’s Local Pain Educator and Collectives Program. Together, we gained MRFF support for EQUiPP, the first phase of which involved community consultation to understand how people access health information. Nine community-specific data collection events were held (custom-stickers on geographically-contextualised posters), with semi-structured interviews (audio-recordings, field notes).

 

Results:

205 community members and interest-holders, and 59 HCPs participated (35 interviews). 300 community connection/information-seeking points were identified. Formal information-access and communication networks varied across communities, but included: sporting clubs, HCPs/services, council amenities/venues, and community clubs/associations. Informal networks included: special interest groups, eateries, hotels/pubs and events. Interview data described how and for whom networks operate.

 

Conclusions:

Results informed the content, structure and format of EQUiPP co-design workshops (see Leake et al., abstract) aimed at developing bespoke chronic pain education campaigns tailored to 7 rural towns in our target PHN and LHN.