Research Participants!

Hello Everyone!

My name is Elise Candy and I am a psychology honours student at Griffith University, QLD, Australia. I am conducting research into the use of online support groups for headache disorder sufferers in conjunction with my supervisor Professor Paul Martin, a prominent researcher and clinician in the headache disorder field and head of school here at Griffith University.

The title of my research project is ‘Testing a model for online support group use, empowerment processes and psychosocial outcomes for headache sufferers.’

The aim of this project is to determine how accessing headache support groups online impacts on the individual in terms of personal empowerment and its relationship with various psychosocial outcomes, including coping with headaches, self-care self-efficacy in headache management and health-related quality of life.

We believe that this project is important because it will help develop an understanding of how using online support groups empower headache sufferers in terms of headache management, their own personal resources and coping strategies and quality of life.

We also believe that community members might find participating in this research beneficial, with the potential for increased understanding of one’s own coping resources and the potential empowerment processes associated with using such online headache support groups as this.

To complete this survey we require that you meet the following criteria:-

1) Suffered from frequent headaches/migraines for at least 6 months and suffered from headaches/migraines on average at least once per week.
2) 18 years of age or older
3) Have previously used online support groups such as this one (there is no minimum number of visits to these sites to prevent participation!)

The survey should take approximately 15 minutes of your time to complete!
Please follow the link below to find out more information about participating in this research and completing the online survey!

Survey Link:

https://prodsurvey.rcs.griffith.edu.au/prodls190/index.php?sid=84519&lang=en[/url]

Your support in this research would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you,

The Research Team,
Professor Paul Martin and Elise Candy
https://prodsurvey.rcs.griffith.edu.au/prodls190/index.php?sid=84519&lang=en[/url]

Disclaimer: Permission has been granted by the support group moderator to recruit participants for this research from this support group.

Awesome!! I am so glad to hear of this study being done. I may be willing to participate but do need to know more about the project first. I have accessed several online support groups and might be a good candidate for your project. Please send me more information so I can determine if this is a correct move for me.

Thanks,

Faith aka Diana

Hello - a fellow Aussie here (although living overseas). Thanks for the invitation and for studying this grey area.

I've filled in my responses, although I'm a bit concerned that I had to answer many of the questions that simply don't relate to me. My migraines are mostly hormonal and sometimes food/light strobe, and definitely not related to stress, but there was no 'Not applicable' option to fill out. Also, I wasn't sure if you meant 'turning to alcohol and drugs' as in, the drugs that do actually aid migraine prevention or pain, or the ones that you turn to when you can't stand the pain anymore. I certainly can't turn to alcohol as that's one of of my food triggers! I wish I could sometimes though...!

Anyway, I hope that doesn't sound all negative - just wanted to let you know how I found the survey.

Thank you for conducting research is this area! I just read about another study from your University identifying a gene on the X chromosome related to migraines. We really depend on people like you to help find a cure or at least proper treatments for this debilitating disease.

Ps I suggest you add a space for free form comments on your questionnaire. You seem to be looking at several hypotheses, but you will likely find there is a lot more going on than what you are testing for. It may well confound your findings.

Hello,

Thanks to you MigraineGirl and Wendy for taking the time to complete the survey. I know it is quite a task! Thanks also for the feedback! I take your comments on board and will talk to my supervisor about these issues and hopefully I can address them asap for future participants, especially in regards to clarifying the items in the Brief Cope scale.

Faith - I realise the survey link did not upload as planned so I will repost it. The information provided before you start the survey has all the necessary information regarding the purpose, aim, participation requirements and confidentiality of this study. However, if you still feel concerned about a lack of information, or need clarification you can contact me on my email address provided in the information sheet! Please understand however, there is a limit to how much information I can provide before you complete the survey! However, after survey completion, if you require more information about the study itself don't hestitate to contact me!

Again, thanks for your interest and help in my project ladies. It is greatly appreciated and hopefully we will get some good data and results for potential publication!

P.s. If you would like to recieve the results of the study at the completion of this year, please let me know via email we can arrange to send them to you (in aggregated form only however, you will not be able to see your individual results!)

Cheers

Elise.

survey link: https://prodsurvey.rcs.griffith.edu.au/prodls190/index.php?sid=84519&lang=en