Background and objectives: Although Interdisciplinary Multimodal Pain Treatment (IMPT) programmes share a biopsychosocial approach to increase the wellbeing of patients with chronic pain, substantial variation in content and duration have been reported. In addition, it is unclear to what extent any favourable health outcomes are maintained over time. Therefore, our first aim was to identify and analyse the change over time of patient-related outcome measures in cohorts of patients who participated in IMPT programmes. Our second aim was to acquire insight into the heterogeneity of IMPT programmes. Databases and data treatment: The study protocol was registered in Prospero under CRD42018076093. We searched Medline, Embase, PsycInfo and Cinahl from inception to May 2020. All study selection, data extraction and risk of bias assessments were independently performed by two researchers. Study cohorts were eligible if they included adult patients with chronic primary musculoskeletal pain for at least 3 months. We assessed the change over time, by calculating pre-post, post-follow-up and pre-follow-up contrasts for seven different patient-reported outcome domains. To explore the variability between the IMPT programmes, we summarized the patient characteristics and treatment programmes using the intervention description and replication checklist. Results: The majority of the 72 included patient cohorts significantly improved during treatment. Importantly, this improvement was generally maintained at follow-up. In line with our expectations and with previous studies, we observed substantial methodological and statistical heterogeneity. Conclusions: This study shows that participation in an IMPT programme is associated with considerable improvements in wellbeing that are generally maintained at follow-up. The current study also found substantial heterogeneity in dose and treatment content, which suggests different viewpoints on how to optimally design an IMPT programme. Significance: The current study provides insight into the different existing approaches regarding the dose and content of IMPT programs. This analysis contributes to an increased understanding of the various approaches by which a biopsychosocial perspective on chronic pain can be translated to treatment programs. Furthermore, despite theoretical and empirical assertions regarding the difficulty to maintain newly learned health behaviors over time, the longitudinal analysis of health outcomes did not find a relapse pattern for patients who participated in IMPT programs.
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Background. The Treatment Beliefs Questionnaire has been developed to measure patients’ beliefs of necessity of and concerns about rehabilitation. Preliminary evidence suggests that these beliefs may be associated with attendance of rehabilitation. The aim of this study was to translate and adapt the Treatment Beliefs Questionnaire for interdisciplinary pain rehabilitation and to examine the measurement properties of the Dutch translation including the predictive validity for dropout. Methods. The questionnaire was translated in 4 steps: forward translation from English into Dutch, achieving consensus, back translation into English, and pretesting on providers and patients. In order to establish structural validity, internal consistency, construct validity, and predictive validity of the questionnaire, 188 participants referred to a rehabilitation centre for outpatient interdisciplinary pain rehabilitation completed the questionnaire at the baseline. Dropout was measured as the number of patients starting, but not completing the programme. For reproducibility, 51 participants were recruited at another rehabilitation centre to complete the questionnaire at the baseline and one week later. Results. We confirmed the structural validity of the Treatment beliefs Questionnaire in the Dutch translation with three subscales, necessity, concerns, and perceived barriers. internal consistency was acceptable with ordinal alphas ranging from 0.66–0.87. Reproducibility was acceptable with ICC2,1 agreement ranging from 0.67–0.81. Hypotheses testing confirmed construct validity, similar to the original questionnaire. Predictive validity showed the questionnaire was unable to predict dropouts. Conclusion. Cross-cultural translation was successfully completed, and the Dutch Treatment Beliefs Questionnaire demonstrates similar psychometric properties as the original English version.
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Purpose To empirically define the concept of burden of neck pain. The lack of a clear understanding of this construct from the perspective of persons with neck pain and care providers hampers adequate measurement of this burden. An additional aim was to compare the conceptual model obtained with the frequently used Neck Disability Index (NDI). Methods Concept mapping, combining qualitative (nominal group technique and group consensus) and quantitative research methods (cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling), was applied to groups of persons with neck pain (n = 3) and professionals treating persons with neck pain (n = 2). Group members generated statements, which were organized into concept maps. Group members achieved consensus about the number and description of domains and the researchers then generated an overall mind map covering the full breadth of the burden of neck pain. Results Concept mapping revealed 12 domains of burden of neck pain: impaired mobility neck, neck pain, fatigue/concentration, physical complaints, psychological aspects/consequences, activities of daily living, social participation, financial consequences, difficult to treat/difficult to diagnose, difference of opinion with care providers, incomprehension by social environment, and how person with neck pain deal with complaints. All ten items of the NDI could be linked to the mind map, but the NDI measures only part of the burden of neck pain. Conclusion This study revealed the relevant domains for the burden of neck pain from the viewpoints of persons with neck pain and their care providers. These results can guide the identification of existing measurements instruments for each domain or the development of new ones to measure the burden of neck pain.
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To decrease the environmental impact caused by the construction sector, biobased materials need to be further developed to allow better integration and acceptance in the market. Mycelium composites are innovative products, with intrinsic properties which rise the attention of architects, designers and industrial companies. Until now, research has focused on the mechanical properties of mycelium products. The aim has been improving their mechanical strength, to achieve wider application in the construction sector. Alongside this, to introduce mycelium composites to a wider market, the aesthetic experience of the public also needs to be considered. In the context of this proposal, it is argued that users of biobased products can shift their attitudes towards their surroundings by adjusting to the visual aesthetics within their environment or products they surround themselves with (Hekkert, 1997). This can be further attributed to colours which can be experienced as warm or cold, aggressive or inviting, leading to experiences that may include pleasure or displeasure indicating the future success of the bio based product. Mycelium composites can be used as building materials, but also as interior design materials, therefore visible to its user. It is to determine the appropriate methodologies to confer colour to mycelium composites that the companies Impershield and Dorable came together to form the consortium for the present project. The investigated ways are: 1. Through the preliminary colouring of fibres and their use as substrate for mycelium growth 2. The surface treatment of the final product. The Centre of Expertise BioBased Economy (CoEBBE) and the Centre of Applied Research for Art and Design (CARADT) will be guiding the research through their experience with mycelium composites. This project will lay the basis to enhance visual appearance of mycelium composites, with the utilization of natural pigments, natural paints and coatings.
Low back pain is the leading cause of disability worldwide and a significant contributor to work incapacity. Although effective therapeutic options are scarce, exercises supervised by a physiotherapist have shown to be effective. However, the effects found in research studies tend to be small, likely due to the heterogeneous nature of patients' complaints and movement limitations. Personalized treatment is necessary as a 'one-size-fits-all' approach is not sufficient. High-tech solutions consisting of motions sensors supported by artificial intelligence will facilitate physiotherapists to achieve this goal. To date, physiotherapists use questionnaires and physical examinations, which provide subjective results and therefore limited support for treatment decisions. Objective measurement data obtained by motion sensors can help to determine abnormal movement patterns. This information may be crucial in evaluating the prognosis and designing the physiotherapy treatment plan. The proposed study is a small cohort study (n=30) that involves low back pain patients visiting a physiotherapist and performing simple movement tasks such as walking and repeated forward bending. The movements will be recorded using sensors that estimate orientation from accelerations, angular velocities and magnetometer data. Participants complete questionnaires about their pain and functioning before and after treatment. Artificial analysis techniques will be used to link the sensor and questionnaire data to identify clinically relevant subgroups based on movement patterns, and to determine if there are differences in prognosis between these subgroups that serve as a starting point of personalized treatments. This pilot study aims to investigate the potential benefits of using motion sensors to personalize the treatment of low back pain. It serves as a foundation for future research into the use of motion sensors in the treatment of low back pain and other musculoskeletal or neurological movement disorders.
The ENCHANT project aims to clarify the differences between circular Calcium Carbonate (CCC) and grounded Calcium Carbonate (GCC), in order to expand the applications of the circular alternative CCC in the paint and coating industry. CCC is produced by pyrolysis from paper waste in an innovative process developed by the company Alucha Works B.V., and it can be applied again as filler or binder in consumer products (e.g. plastics, rubbers, paints and coatings) in a cost-effective manner. Products containing CCC have a higher content of circular resources, which minimizes their carbon footprint, and reduces the exploitation of primary resources. Performances of CCC in oil-based paints, however, is not optimal, due to a larger oil adsorption as compared to GCC. A physical and chemical characterization of CCC and GCC samples, including competitive oil-water adsorption measurements, would help Alucha to formulate a solution to match the properties of CCC and GCC, either adjusting the recycling process or applying a surface modification treatment to CCC. This would enable Alucha to expand the market for CCC, making oil-based formulation products more circular.
