Fall 2024
The Pain Management Collaboratory (PMC) Coordinating Center: An Interview with Co-Director Dr. Robert Kerns
Laura E. Laumann, PhD1; Katherine E. Gnall, MS2; Mariel Emrich, BS2 - Pain SIG
The Pain SIG interviewed Dr. Robert Kerns, a Professor Emeritus and Senior Research Scientist at Yale University and one of the three directors of the Pain Management Collaboratory (PMC) Coordinating Center. We were eager to learn more about the Collaboratory, its mission, and the research it supports.
Pain SIG: Can you briefly tell us about the PMC and its mission? What is your role in the PMC?
Dr. Kerns: The PMC is an important tri-government agency partnership involving the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Department of Defense (DOD), and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). I am one of the three directors of the Coordinating Center, along with Drs. Cynthia Brandt and Peter Peduzzi. The Coordinating Center has a large infrastructure designed to support many separately-funded pragmatic clinical trials of non-pharmacological approaches for the management of pain and common co-occurring conditions. The mission of the Collaboratory is to address the obvious gap between substantial evidence of the effectiveness of non-pharmacological approaches and their limited uptake in routine clinical care.
When the initiative was launched in 2017, the Coordinating Center was funded for a six-year period. Eleven pragmatic clinical trials were separately funded at that same time. In the context of continuing the entire enterprise for another six years, five additional projects have been funded with more expected. Currently, there are 16 trials either funded or that have received notice of award.
Pain SIG: Could you give us a sense of the focus of some of the ongoing pragmatic clinical trials?
Dr. Kerns: The trials themselves, following an NIH model of a UG3/UH3 mechanism, support a one- or two-year pilot demonstration phase, and contingent on reaching milestones -- which all of them have -- transition to an implementation phase. Over 18,000 active-duty service members, dependents, or Veterans have been recruited and participated in these trials, which gives you a sense of the magnitude of the initiative.
Our trials thus far have been a mix of studies focusing on specific interventions like mindfulness, chiropractic, or spinal manipulation and studies focused on testing models of care or care pathways. An important part of this initiative is learning about pragmatic trials- their design, methods, and enactment.
Pain SIG: How can people learn about the outcomes of these clinical trials?
Dr: Kerns: Fortunately, organizations like SBM, United States Association for the Study of Pain (USASP), and other entities provide a forum for presenting findings to the field. For example, one trial that has already started presenting its effectiveness results is a trial by Dr. Diana Burgess called the LAMP Trial.
The Collaboratory partners with the VA’s Center for Information, Dissemination, and Educational Resources (CIDER) and the Pain Management, Opioid Safety, and Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PMOP), and other entities to sponsor a monthly webinar series called Spotlight on Pain Management. Starting this fall, Dr. Burgess will be presenting her findings in that venue. Subsequently, through the rest of the academic year, most of the presentations will be from the other PIs or their teams representing these projects.
A list of all the publications that are attributable to the Collaboratory is available on the website. That is another amazing accomplishment – close to 80 publications since we started.
Pain SIG: What opportunities are available to pain researchers and clinicians who would like to get involved in the PMC?
Dr. Kerns: These trials have all been funded through requests for applications (RFAs) published through NIH or DoD to date. For any interested investigator, it is important to stay tuned for forthcoming funding announcements.
Beyond that, pay attention to the PMC website. There is information about lessons learned, harmonization of measurement approaches, among other important resources to inform future applications for funding.
I am a good point of contact – folks can reach out to me, share their interest, and I can help connect them to others in the Collaboratory. We want to encourage open communication – take advantage of our Work Groups and experts to help shape up the best possible application.
Pain SIG: We have many student and early career researchers in our membership. What advice would you give this next generation of pain researchers?
Dr. Kerns: I am thrilled about this engagement. We don’t have enough behavioral pain scientists. My advice is focus on the task at hand – your training. With the support of your mentors, I hope people feel empowered to reach out to other researchers in other institutions, including the PMC. We want to support early career investigators and students.
Pain SIG: Is there anything else you would like to share with the SBM community?
Dr. Kerns: Gratitude for organizations like SBM. SBM has been an important professional home throughout my career.
More information on the PMC be found on the website: https://painmanagementcollaboratory.org/
Affiliations
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University
- Graduate Student, University of Connecticut