The Student Athlete Wellness Portal: Translating Student Athletes' Prescription Opioid Use Narratives into a Targeted Public Health Intervention.

Background and

Objectives

The opioid epidemic has permeated all strata of society over the last two decades, especially within the adolescent student athletic environment, a group particularly at risk and presenting their own challenges for science and practice. This paper (a) describes the development of a web-based intervention called the Student Athlete Wellness Portal that models effective opioid misuse resistance strategies and (b) details the findings of a single-group design to test its effectiveness. Materials and

Methods

Formative research included 35 student athletes residing in the United States, ages 14 to 21, who had been injured in their school-based sport. They participated in in-depth qualitative interviews to explore narratives relating to their injuries and pain management plans. Inductive analyses of interview transcripts revealed themes of the challenges of being a student athlete, manageable vs. unmanageable pain, and ways to stay healthy. These themes were translated into prevention messages for the portal, which was then tested in a single-group design.

Results

Users of the portal (n = 102) showed significant decreases in their willingness to misuse opioids and increases in their perceptions of opioid risks.

Conclusions

This manuscript illuminates the processes involved in translating basic research knowledge into intervention scripts and reveals the promising effects of a technology-based wellness portal.