As a large national healthcare system, Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is ideally suited to build on its work to date and develop a safe, evidence-based, and comprehensive approach to the care of chronic musculoskeletal pain conditions that de-emphasizes opioid use and emphasizes non-pharmacological strategies. The VHA Office of Health Services Research and Development (HSR&D) held a state-of-the-art (SOTA) conference titled "Non-pharmacological Approaches to Chronic Musculoskeletal Pain Management" in November 2016. Goals of the conference were (1) to establish consensus on the current state of evidence regarding non-pharmacological approaches to chronic musculoskeletal pain to inform VHA policy in this area and (2) to begin to identify priorities for the future VHA research agenda. Workgroups were established and asked to reach consensus recommendations on clinical and research priorities for the following treatment strategies: psychological/behavioral therapies, exercise/movement therapies, manual therapies, and models for delivering multimodal pain care. Participants in the SOTA identified nine non-pharmacological therapies with sufficient evidence to be implemented across the VHA system as part of pain care. Participants further recommended that effective integration of these non-pharmacological approaches across the VHA and especially into VHA primary care, pain care, and mental health settings should be a priority, and that these treatments should be offered early in the course of pain treatment and delivered in a team-based, multimodal treatment setting concurrently with active self-care and self-management approaches. In addition, we recommend that VHA leadership and policy makers systematically address the barriers to implementation of these approaches by expanding opportunities for clinician and veteran education on the effectiveness of these strategies; supporting and funding further research to determine optimal dosage, duration, sequencing, combination, and frequency of treatment; emphasizing multimodal care with rigorous evaluation grounded in team-based approaches to test integrated models of delivery and stepped-care approaches; and working to address socioeconomic and cultural barriers to veterans' access to non-pharmacological approaches.

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Study design: Longitudinal analysis of SCI registry merged with VHA administrative-data and Medicare claims files (FY1999-2002. Objectives: To estimate the prevalence of mental illness (MI) and substance use disorders (SUDs) among veteran health administration (VHA) clinic users with spinal cord injuries (SCI) and examine subgroup variations by demographic, socioeconomic characteristics, and duration and level of SCI. Setting: VHA clinic users (N ¼ 8338) with SCI who were alive by the end of FY2002. Methods: ICD-9-CM codes were used to identify individual MI (anxiety disorders, bipolar, depressive disorders, psychoses, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and schizophrenia) and categories of SUDs (tobacco, alcohol and drug abuse). Chi-square tests and multinomial logistic regression were used to examine the demographic and socio-economic profile of VHA users with SCI and MI and/or SUD. Results: Over a 2-year period, 46% VHA users with SCI had either a MI or SUDs: 20% had MI only; 12% had SUD only and 14% had both. The most common MI was depressive disorder (27%) and tobacco use was highly prevalent (19%). African-Americans (versus whites) were less likely to be diagnosed with MI only. Increased duration of SCI lowered the likelihood of MI and/or SUDs. Mood and anxiety disorders were highly prevalent in veterans with SCI with chronic physical conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, and respiratory diseases. Conclusions: Mental illness and SUDs are highly prevalent in the VHA population with SCI and is complicated by the high rates of chronic physical conditions, presenting challenges in their healthcare management

Prevalence of substance use disorder and mental illness differed by socio-demographics, suggesting the need for tailored diabetes management interventions.