Getting Active Mindfully: Rationale and Case Illustration of a Group Mind-body and Activity Program for Chronic Pain

Abstract

Chronic pain is associated with substantial decreases in physical and emotional health. Psychosocial and physical restoration interventions, although potentially helpful, typically show small-to-moderate improvements that are limited to the short term, and often exhibit problematic adherence. Here, we present GetActive-Fitbit, a novel 10-week group program that integrates mind-body skills, pain coping and gradual increases in activity reinforced by a commercially available digital monitoring device (Fitbit). We illustrate the program among a group of 4 adults with heterogeneous chronic pain. We also highlight pre to post-program improvements in physical function (objective, performance-based and self-report), emotional function (depression and anxiety) and other relevant outcomes targeted by the program (e.g., pain intensity, catastrophizing, mindfulness, coping, kinesiophobia, emotional support, social isolation, pain resilience, program satisfaction and impression of change). Group participants' experiences suggest that GetActive-Fitbit is credible, useful, and shows potential to improve physical and emotional function among this challenging population.Clinical trial number: NCT03412916.

Keywords: Activity; Case study; Chronic pain; Fitbit; Mind-body.

Conflict of interest statement

Compliance with Ethical Standards

Conflict of interest Jonathan Greenberg, Ann Lin, Paula J. Popok, Ronald J. Kulich, Robert R. Edwards and Ana-Maria Vranceanu declare that they have no conflict of interest.

© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC part of Springer Nature.

Figures

Fig. 1

Weekly averaged Fitbit steps over the GetActive-Fitbit program