I imagine you've found your way to this website to locate some resources regarding ACT and chronic pain. (Note: Oct 2024 - I'm still adding resources as time allows - email me if you are looking for a protocol or questionnaire and I'll get it here faster).

There are links to the top left side that have manuals, measures, and information on my papers.

My academic website and CV details are also to the left in case you want to take a look at those.

A brief synopsis of who I am and my work:

Mostly, I am interested in treatments for chronic pain that are adequate to its complexity - for me, those are treatments that restore people to meaningful living.

I have devoted a significant portion of my career to the development, implementation, and evaluation of rehabilitative approaches to the treatment of chronic pain – interventions that aid individuals with chronic pain to return to meaningful living even when, or especially when, pain continues. In particular, I have examined the utility of one model of intervention for chronic pain, called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ‘ACT’ (said as one work). My work in chronic pain has contributed significantly to the evidence base in this area and has significantly impacted both practice and policy in relation to the treatment of chronic pain internationally. 

My colleagues and I have: (1) shown that ACT for chronic pain is effective and yields clinically significant improvements up to three years following treatment; (2) rigorously examined treatment process information which has provided robust support for treatment mechanisms of pain acceptance, present focused awareness, and engagement in valued activity; and (3) implemented these interventions at the ‘coal face’ of clinics and healthcare systems. This work has taken place in multiple healthcare settings, including the United States (US) Veterans’ Health Administration (VA), United Kingdom’s (UK) National Health Service, and academic and private health centers across the US, Europe, South America, and Australia/New Zealand. 

I have successfully either led or been a part of a number of grants funded by various extramural bodies, including the National Institutes of Health, UK Research and Innovation, and the European Parliament. My work has been cited in government policy documents regarding chronic pain, opioids, and interdisciplinary care, including the Departments/Ministries of Health in the US, UK, Australia, Canada, Spain, the Netherlands, Spain, and Portugal, for example. 

As a part of this same work, I have examined issues involving opioid and other substance use in chronic pain to aid in determining the key risk factors involved in (1) substance use becoming harmful, (2) the prevalence rates of harmful use in those with chronic pain, and (3) interventions to aid in the rehabilitation of functioning when chronic pain is co-morbid with harmful use. As of 2024, I am co-leading on a large trial examining the efficacy of an integrated treatment for chronic pain and opioid use disorder, which is funded by the US National Institutes of Health. This seven year trial will conclude in early 2026. I have a variety of other grant funded and non-funded projects underway, primarily involving those with chronic pain. 

I am actively involved in clinical work and implementation. For example, as part of my contract with QUB, I spend a day per week working within the NHS where I helped to establish the Belfast Centre for Pain Rehabilitation, which offers interdisciplinary treatment for those experiencing chronic pain. That Centre began the island’s first interdisciplinary pain rehabilitation programme for chronic pain in 2022 and has an active research mission to aid in broadening access to evidence-based care for chronic pain in Northern Ireland and to use appropriate scientific methods to evaluate the evidence of the treatments provided. I have also been awarded grant funding to support a secondment to the Complex Pain Service in Children’s Health Ireland, whose team ran the island’s first interdisciplinary paediatric pain rehabilitation program in 2024. 

With regard to service, I serve on editorial boards and as an editor for several journals and regularly sit on grant review panels for a number of internationally funders. More locally, I sit on the Steering Committee of the ‘Better Days’ community pain support programme, which is a community-led initiative offered by members of the Healthy Living Centre Alliance. This is a region wide support programme that is currently contracted by the Northern Ireland Department of Health. Details about their excellent work, and about accessing upcoming programmes can be found here. I am active in several committees within the European Pain Federation, which seeks to increase access to scientifically adequate interventions for chronic pain across Europe and establish clinical care guidelines and standards to aid the field.