The impact of a short educational movie on promoting chronic pain health literacy in school: A feasibility study.

Background: School-based health education programs on chronic pain providing information about the proper management of recurrent and chronic pain may increase health literacy in terms of pain knowledge, may thereby prevent dysfunctional coping and may decrease the risk of pain chronification. The aim of the present feasibility study was to evaluate the effectiveness of an educational movie on recurrent and chronic pain in increasing pain knowledge among students.

Methods: N = 95 adolescent students provided demographic and pain-related information and completed a pain knowledge questionnaire before and after viewing an educational movie on recurrent and chronic pain. Participants were classified as experiencing frequent pain if they reported pain at least once a week in the last 3 months.

Results: One-third of the participants experienced frequent pain. There was a significant increase in pain knowledge for all participants (ηp2 = 0.544). Students with frequent pain had a stronger knowledge increase regarding the management of chronic and recurrent pain than those without frequent pain (ηp2 = 0.087). Sex did not moderate the gain in pain knowledge.

Conclusions: This feasibility study provides first evidence that a short educational movie on recurrent and chronic pain may increase chronic pain health literacy in students. Future studies should investigate the long-term retention of pain knowledge and any associated effects on behaviour change. Due to barriers to the implementation of interventional studies in the school setting, these studies should use a waitlist control group design and online data collection.

Significance: This feasibility study provides first evidence for the effectiveness of an 11-min educational movie on chronic pain in increasing chronic pain knowledge in students. Students with frequent pain benefitted more from the education than students without frequent pain.