About GAPPA

Global Alliance of Partners for Pain Advocacy (GAPPA) is creating partnerships between people with lived experience of pain, patient advocates, researchers, and clinicians around the world, to advance the study, understanding, and treatment of pain. 

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GAPPA’s expertise makes them exceptional collaborators on many research projects that align with their values and aims. One of GAPPA’s main goals is facilitating connections between researchers and those living with pain.

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GAPPA is an alliance of people living with pain, patient advocates, and IASP traditional members, including researchers and clinicians. GAPPA also recognizes that the distinction between these two subgroups is artificial, and seeks to bridge the artificial divide between them, with a view to closing it. The views and contributions of all members will be treated with equal consideration.

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GAPPA is not an advocacy organization representing individual patients but an organization that supports advocacy, partnership, co-creation and integration of the lived experience into all areas of pain research, management and education.

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GAPPA will be established as an independent organization with a relationship to IASP. This will allow GAPPA to have its own governance structure and to apply for funding opportunities not available to IASP, while maintaining the connection to IASP that is essential for GAPPA’s agreed mission.

 

This is also in accordance with the initial charge of the Task Force approved by the IASP Council in April 2019.