Bio
Beth Darnall, PhD is Director of the Stanford Pain Relief Innovations Lab. She leads NIH and PCORI-funded clinical trials that broadly investigate behavioral medicine for acute and chronic pain, including a $9M multi-state trial on voluntary patient-centered prescription opioid reduction that is funded by PCORI. She serves as faculty mentor to junior investigators who are Stanford Pain NIDA T-32 post-doctoral research fellows, NIDA K23 awardees, and through the Stanford CTSA.
Her primary interests are developing and investigating novel pain treatments that are scalable, effective, and low burden. She and her team lead international workshops to train clinicians to deliver the single-session evidence-based pain relief skills class, "Empowered Relief" (https://empoweredrelief.com). "Empowered Relief" is available in English, French and Spanish, and exists in healthcare systems in the U.S., and in Australia, U.K., Denmark and Canada, and is the subject of international research. Digital analgesic innovations include on-demand, skills-based, self-regulatory treatment for perioperative patients (“My Surgical Success”), and virtual reality for acute and chronic pain (she is chief science advisor for appliedVR). The broad goal of this collective line of research is to dismantle barriers to effective behavioral medicine for pain and health.
She leads the PCORI-funded EMPOWER study, a 4-state pragmatic randomized controlled clinical trial that is investigating how to best help physicians and patients successfully and voluntarily reduce long term opioid use and chronic pain using patient-centered methods. EMPOWER is a 3-arm RCT comparative effectiveness trial of two evidence-based behavioral treatments, cognitive behavioral therapy for pain and chronic pain self-management, applied within the context of patient-centered opioid tapering (N=1365). This research builds on the team's first report on "Patient-Centered Prescription Opioid Tapering in Community Outpatients with Chronic Pain" (Darnall et al, JAMA Int Med, 2018). Learn more about the EMPOWER study at https://empower.stanford.edu/
Darnall twice briefed the U.S. Congress on the opioid and pain crises, and provided invited testimony to the FDA on iatrogenic harms associated with opioid tapering. In 2020 she joined the NIH Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee as a scientific member. Also in 2020 she was appointed to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Opioid Workgroup of the Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (BSC/NCIPC).
Her work has been featured in outlets such as Scientific American, NPR Radio, BBC Radio, and Nature. In 2018 she spoke on the psychology of pain relief at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Academic Appointments
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Associate Professor - Med Center Line, Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine
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Associate Professor - Med Center Line (By courtesy), Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Administrative Appointments
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CDC Opioid Workgroup (BSC/NCIPC), Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (BSC/NCIPC) (2020 - Present)
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NIH Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (IPRCC). Scientific member., National Institutes of Health (2020 - 2022)
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Co-Chair, Acute Pain Task Force, Stanford Hospital (2019 - Present)
Honors & Awards
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FDA Network of Experts in Digital Health Technologies, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2020)
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Digital Behavioral Medicine for Pain Relief and Opioid Reduction (invited speaker), NIH 15th Annual Pain Research Consortium Symposium (2020)
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Opioid Tapering Iatrogenic Risks (invited testimony), U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2019)
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Pain and Opioid Crisis in America (invited speaker), U.S. Congressional Briefing (2018)
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Non-pharmacologic Treatment for Chronic Pain (invited speaker), National Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology (2018)
Boards, Advisory Committees, Professional Organizations
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Scientific Member, NIH Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (IPRCC), National Institutes of Health (2020 - Present)
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CDC Opioid Workgroup Member, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (2020 - Present)
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Network of Experts in Digital Health Technologies, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2020 - Present)
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Editorial Board, MedPage Today (2020 - Present)
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Board of Directors, Institute for Brain Potential (2020 - Present)
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Chief Scientific Advisor, appliedVR (2019 - Present)
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Co-Chair, Behavioral Medicine Committee, American Academy of Pain Medicine (2019 - Present)
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Opioid Guideline Task Force, American Academy of Pain Medicine (2019 - Present)
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Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (ad hoc member), National Institutes of Health (2019 - 2019)
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Opioid Advisory Committee, American Academy of Pain Medicine (2017 - Present)
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Scientific Review and Guidelines Committee, American Academy of Pain Medicine (2017 - Present)
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Education Initiatives Working Group, International Association for the Study of Pain (2016 - 2018)
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Committee Member and Co-Author, ACOEM Chronic Pain National Guideline (2016 - 2017)
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APS Clinical Resources and Guidelines Committee, American Pain Society (2015 - 2018)
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Committee on the Principles of Analgesic Use in the Treatment of Chronic Pain and Cancer Pain, American Pain Society (2014 - 2016)
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President, Pain Society of Oregon (2012 - 2012)
Professional Education
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PhD Training: University of Colorado at Boulder (2002) CO
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Fellowship: The Johns Hopkins University (2004) MD
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Internship: Southern Arizona VA Healthcare System (2002) AZ
Community and International Work
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Stanford Free Back Pain Education Day 2015, Stanford University
Topic
Community Outreach for people with back pain
Partnering Organization(s)
Stanford Hospitals and Clinics
Populations Served
Chronic Back Pain
Location
International
Ongoing Project
No
Opportunities for Student Involvement
No
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Stanford 2014 Free Chronic Pain Education Day, Stanford University
Topic
Living Well with Chronic Pain
Partnering Organization(s)
Western Pain Society
Populations Served
Chronic Pain
Location
Bay Area
Ongoing Project
No
Opportunities for Student Involvement
No
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Mirror therapy certification workshops for physicians, trauma, and healthcare providers in Vietnam, Can Tho, Dong Ha, and Hanoi, Vietnam
Topic
Self-delivered mirror therapy for phantom pain
Partnering Organization(s)
International Association for the Study of Pain; End the Pain Project; HealthSaaS
Populations Served
Vietnamese amputees
Location
International
Ongoing Project
No
Opportunities for Student Involvement
Yes