Empowering the patient and family voice is a game changer.
It transforms pain research and care for children and their families.
Partnering For Pain recognizes the unique expertise of people with lived experience. We partner with patients and family members as integral members of the research team across all stages of the research process, including planning, conducting, and sharing about the research.



Improving health outcomes and the healthcare system
Patient engagement is doing research ‘with’ or ‘by’ members of the public, rather than ‘to’, ‘about’, or ‘for’ them (INVOLVE, 2018). Patient engagement meaningfully and actively partners with patients and families in health research. Inclusiveness, support, mutual respect, and co-building are its core principles. (CIHR, 2018)
Patient engagement enhances the quality, effectiveness, and value of health research. It reduces the estimated 17 gap between research and clinical care to ensure that scientific knowledge more quickly reaches the hands of people who can use it every day.

Our commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusion
We recognize that purposeful efforts are needed. We actively work to engage individuals from underrepresented and racialized groups, including Black, Indigenous, people of colour, gender nonconforming, and people with disabilities. We are leading the way in patient partnership in areas such as compensation and co-authorship in scientific publications.


What people are sharing

Katherine
Youth Living with Pain
“Being a patient partner has given me confidence by focusing on my abilities. Being on a team of researchers and healthcare providers gives the sense of having a community behind you. I never thought I would have the opportunity to play such a crucial role in a research project.”

Esther
Mother of a Youth Living with Pain
“It is great to have the patients and families’ voices at the table because we have a different set of eyes. I think we need more of these opportunities, Canada-wide.”

Carley
Youth Living with Pain
“Participating as a patient partner is empowering. It’s validation that what we experience is real and that healthcare professionals and researchers truly believe in what we are saying."

Living with chronic pain is hard. Follow one family’s experience through their journey with pain
Patient Stories

Justina's Story

Justina's Story
I have been living with chronic pain since I was 16 years-old. I live with pain every day because I have a rheumatological condition. When I got my diagnosis, my whole life turned upside down.
Rachael's Story
I am a childhood cancer survivor and I live with many different late effects of cancer treatment. One of the effects is chronic pain. For many years, my doctors did not think my pain was a priority, but eventually, I was referred to a pain clinic.


Rachael's Story
I am a childhood cancer survivor and I live with many different late effects of cancer treatment. One of the effects is chronic pain. For many years, my doctors did not think my pain was a priority, but eventually, I was referred to a pain clinic.

Katherine's Story
School is very difficult when you have chronic pain. For me the workload wasn’t the biggest challenge, it was convincing my teachers and principle that I was truly in pain.

Katherine's Story
School is very difficult when you have chronic pain. For me the workload wasn’t the biggest challenge, it was convincing my teachers and principle that I was truly in pain.
Matthew's Story
I have been living with chronic pain for a long time and I’m not sure I remember when it began. It was always there, in the background and I just got used to living with it.


Matthew's Story
I have been living with chronic pain for a long time and I’m not sure I remember when it began. It was always there, in the background and I just got used to living with it.

Dolores & Dallyne's Story
Living in a small First Nations Community in Saskatchewan, it was hard to get the right treatment for my daughter Dallyne. Dallyne always had pain, probably since she was born. We just didn’t know that because she was too young to tell us and the closest specialist was three and a half hours away in Saskatoon.

Dolores & Dallyne's Story
Living in a small First Nations Community in Saskatchewan, it was hard to get the right treatment for my daughter Dallyne. Dallyne always had pain, probably since she was born. We just didn’t know that because she was too young to tell us and the closest specialist was three and a half hours away in Saskatoon.