What is De-STRESS?
People with chronic pain often feel low, exhausted, and have trouble doing the things they normally do. Doctors commonly identify this low mood as depression. However, there is evidence that this may be pain-related distress – negative emotions related to the impact that chronic pain has on everyday life. This means that treatments for depression, such as antidepressant medications, are inappropriate. Indeed, many patients don’t want antidepressants, and don't improve after being prescribed them.
De-STRESS is a research project, ran by the University of Southampton and Keele University. It aimed to explore pain-related distress in people with chronic musculoskeletal pain and develop a new strategy to help improve the wellbeing of people living with pain-related distress. Read about the different stages of the De-STRESS study below.
What is De-STRESS?
Study Team
What did we do?
The research was conducted over 3 stages:
Stage 1 involved interviews with patients and GPs to explore how these groups understand pain-related distress differs from depression.
Findings: Coming soon
Stage 2 involved a questionnaire study of people with chronic musculoskeletal pain and people with clinical depression to identify characteristics of pain-related distress and distinguish it from clinical depression.
Findings: Coming soon
In Stage 3 researchers worked with patients to develop and test a pilot patient-centred intervention to reduce pain-related distress. The intervention included 4-6 sessions with a social prescriber and access to a study website. The study explored whether people
Findings: Coming soon
Events
The De-STRESS Study Engagement Day
In June 2024 we held a study engagement day at Keele University. The event was attended by over 30 people including people with pain, the Research User Group (RUG) at Keele University, General Practitioners, Physiotherapists, Social Prescribers, pain charity representatives and local commissioners.
We presented the study and our findings and discussed how we can take the research forward. Discussions were insightful and valuable, with many different perspectives offered.
We were joined by Ian Taverner, also known as Mr Cookfulness for a live cooking demonstration and learnt ways cooking can be adapted when living with pain. Ian has lots of videos and tips on his website: www.cookfulness.co.uk Thank you to everyone who attended – it was a great day!
Publications
Supporting people with pain-related distress in primary care consultations: a qualitative study | British Journal of General Practice (bjgp.org)
Noureen A Shivji, Adam WA Geraghty, Hollie Birkinshaw, Tamar Pincus, Helen Johnson, Paul Little, Michael Moore, Beth Stuart and Carolyn A Chew-Graham | British Journal of General Practice 2022; 72 (724): e825-e833. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3399/BJGP.2022.0120
Where we are going next?
We are developing a new study to further explore the De-STRESS pain intervention.
One of our team members, Hollie, has also been awarded a NIHR School for Primary Care Research fellowship to further explore pain-related distress in short-term musculoskeletal pain. This research project is ongoing until April 2026.