Co-Adaptation of an Digital Pain Management Program for Canadian Veterans

Chronic pain affects approximately 30% to 50% of Canadian Veterans, many of whom experience barriers to accessing interprofessional pain services, particularly when transitioning from military to civilian healthcare. Digital health interventions may help address gaps in care by providing accessible, evidence-based self-management support while Veterans await services or alongside their existing clinical care. However, these interventions must be adapted to reflect Veterans' needs and experiences, including military culture, values and language, pain- and mental health-related stigma, experiences of trauma, and challenges navigating the civilian healthcare system. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is an evidence-based psychological intervention that can improve pain-related functioning, pain acceptance, and quality of life among people living with chronic pain, including Veterans. The current study will support the co-adaptation of an existing self-guided digital ACT intervention delivered through the Manage My Pain mobile health platform. Canadian Veterans living with chronic pain and clinicians experienced in providing evidence-based pain psychology interventions to Veterans will use the existing program and provide feedback through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Their feedback will inform modifications to the program's content, language, format, and delivery to create Advancing Online Pain Psychology Tools for Canadian Veterans (ADOPT-CanVets). The adapted program will subsequently be ready for evaluation in a feasibility trial. Once evaluated, ADOPT-CanVets may provide a scalable approach to increasing Canadian Veterans' access to evidence-based psychological support for chronic pain.