Pain, the Opioid Epidemic, and Depression

Jeffrey F. Scherrer, PhD is Vice-Chair for Research and Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine and dually appointed Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neuroscience at Saint Louis University School of Medicine, Missouri, US. He received his doctoral degree in health services research and began his academic career at Washington University in St. Louis, focusing on twin studies of substance use disorder and comorbid mental illness. He transferred to Saint Louis University in 2013 and has since devoted considerable time to researching mental and psychosocial outcomes following long-term prescription opioid use. His approach is grounded in observational cohort studies using both retrospective medical record and medical claims data and prospective cohort designs to better understand the inter-relationships between pain, prescription opioid use and misuse and psychiatric disorders.

Jane C. Ballantyne, MD, FRCA is Professor of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, US. She trained in medicine and anaesthesia in the UK before moving to Boston, MA in 1990. She became Chief of the Division of Pain Medicine in the Massachusetts General Hospital in 1999. She moved to the University of Washington in 2011 as Professor of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine. She has editorial roles in several leading journals and textbooks and is a widely published author. She was an early advocate for restraint in opioid prescribing for chronic pain, and has continued to focus her teaching and research on the clinical implications of evolving opioid science.