This study validates the previously tested Screening for Poverty And Related social determinants to improve Knowledge of and access to resources (‘SPARK Tool’) against comparison questions from well-established national surveys (Post Survey Questionnaire (PSQ)) to inform the development of a standardised tool to collect patients’ demographic and social needs data in healthcare.

Cross-sectional study.

Pan-Canadian study of participants from four Canadian provinces (SK, MB, ON and NL).

192 participants were interviewed concurrently, completing both the SPARK tool and PSQ survey.

Survey topics included demographics: language, immigration, race, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation; and social needs: education, income, medication access, transportation, housing, social support and employment status. Concurrent validity was performed to assess agreement and correlation between SPARK and comparison questions at an individual level as well as within domain clusters. We report on Cohen’s kappa measure of inter-rater reliability, Pearson correlation coefficient and Cramer’s V to assess overall capture of needs in the SPARK and PSQ as well as within each domain. Agreement between the surveys was described using correct (true positive and true negative) and incorrect (false positive and false negative) classification.

There was a moderate correlation between SPARK and PSQ (0.44, p60), SPARK correctly classified 90.5% (n=176/191).

SPARK provides a brief 15 min screening tool for primary care clinics to capture social and access needs. SPARK was able to correctly classify most participants within each domain. Related ongoing research is needed to further validate SPARK in a large representative sample and explore primary care implementation strategies to support integration.

Sleep is a biological necessity with vital effects on all tissues and organs of the body. Preoperative sleep disturbance is associated with increased postoperative pain intensity and opioid consumption. Given that insomnia is a potentially modifiable risk factor, interventions targeting sleep prior to surgery may improve postoperative pain control and enhance key outcomes of recovery.

Promoting Sleep to Alleviate Pain-Arthroplasty (PROSAP-A) is a randomised, parallel group, two arm, controlled trial evaluating the effects of preoperative sleep-promotion on postoperative pain control, brain health and physical recovery. The main objective is to investigate whether preoperative insomnia treatment in patients scheduled to undergo total knee arthroplasty (TKA) or total hip arthroplasty (THA) may improve acute postoperative pain control. 100 adults with insomnia disorder (Insomnia Severity Index score >10 and confirmed Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition criteria for persistent insomnia disorder), scheduled to undergo primary TKA or THA, will be randomised to preoperative cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) or an active comparator control intervention, sleep education therapy (SET). Both interventions will be delivered over 4 weeks in hybrid format through a digital self-guided platform in combination with weekly telehealth video sessions with a psychologist (CBT-I) or research nurse (SET). A video-assisted booster session will be provided 1–2 weeks postoperatively. The primary outcome measure is acute postoperative pain intensity, averaged over the first 7 postoperative days (POD). Secondary outcome measures include long-term postoperative pain control, changes in quantitative sensory testing variables (eg, temporal summation, conditioned pain modulation), sleep, cognition (eg, attention, memory, processing speed, executive function), mental health, health-related function, physical activity, quality of life and blood biomarkers. Participants will undergo on-site evaluation preoperative (preintervention and postintervention) and 6 months postoperative. Additional remote assessments will take place during POD1–7, 3 and 12 months postoperative.

The Swedish Ethical Review Authority has approved the PROSAP-A trial protocol. Results will be published in international peer-reviewed journals and summaries will be provided to funders and participants of the trial.

NCT06145516.