# Using Mobile Devices for Neurofeedback to Reduce Opioid Use in Chronic Pain

> **NIH NIH R41** · CROSSCOMM, INC. · 2020 · $255,648

## Abstract

Abstract
One in five Americans has chronic pain. Many pharmacological pain interventions exist but increase risk of
opioid use disorder (OUD). As a result, there is an urgent need for non-addictive pain treatments. One non-
addictive pain treatments is neurofeedback, or electroencephalogram (EEG) biofeedback, which trains patients
to regulate brain states linked to physiological relaxation. Neurofeedback has been used to treat pain in
multiple medical conditions, but traditionally has required travel to clinics. In the past decade, portable EEG
headsets have arrived to market that read brainwaves and send signals to mobile devices via Bluetooth. This
technology affords an opportunity to create a novel mobile platform to enable patients with pain to conduct
neurofeedback at home. A prototype of mobile neurofeedback was piloted by Duke: after three months of use,
patients with chronic pain reported less pain, less anger, less stress, less depression, and better sleep.
CrossComm, a North Carolina-based small business, has a 20+ year history of successfully building human-
computer interfaces and producing them to be commercially available. In this STTR Phase I project,
CrossComm and Duke will collaborate to develop a commercial-ready mobile neurofeedback app and test its
feasibility among patients using opioids to treat chronic pain. Aim 1 is to develop a commercially-ready mobile
neurofeedback app by refining an efficient, intuitive mobile app user experience, identifying more effective
ways of providing auditory feedback, and improving the end-to-end user experience. The app will be built
according to commercial standards of robustness and maintainability, as evidenced by the mobile app meeting
Human Computer Interface (HCI) criteria. Aim 2 is to test feasibility of the new commercially-ready mobile app
with N=30 patients with chronic pain prescribed opioids. They will be given the new mobile neurofeedback app
and an EEG headset and be instructed to practice 10-minute neurofeedback sessions, 4 times a week, for 12
weeks. After, mobile app usage, satisfaction, and usability will be measured to determine feasibility of the
commercial-ready mobile neurofeedback app for patients with chronic pain prescribed opioids. If the above
STTR Phase I aims are met, this will support testing the commercial-ready mobile neurofeedback app in an
STTR Phase II double-blind randomized clinical trial enrolling patients with chronic pain prescribed opioids.
This research is innovative because it develops digital technology therapeutics (mobile medical applications)
that uniquely enable neuromodulatory (neurofeedback) approaches to pain management to be performed
easily and safely by patients with chronic pain anytime, anyplace. The expected outcome is development of a
portable, low-cost, non-addictive treatment pioneering a new framework using translational devices outside the
clinic setting for effective pain management to help combat the opioid crisis in the US. Our ...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10146081
- **Project number:** 1R41DA053011-01
- **Recipient organization:** CROSSCOMM, INC.
- **Principal Investigator:** Donald Kim Shin
- **Activity code:** R41 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $255,648
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2020-09-30 → 2022-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10146081

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10146081, Using Mobile Devices for Neurofeedback to Reduce Opioid Use in Chronic Pain (1R41DA053011-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10146081. Licensed CC0.

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