Almost 3 million Ontarians live with chronic pain. Pain Ontario is a community-based nonprofit transforming how pain is understood and managed across the province — through connection, education, research, and advocacy.
Pain doesn’t fall evenly. Chronic pain disproportionately affects people living in poverty, Indigenous Peoples and racialized communities, 2SLGBTQ+ people, trauma survivors, veterans, people working in the trades, and people living with mental health and substance-use conditions. Our work centres these communities.
Tell us where you’re coming from and we’ll point you to what’s most useful.
You live with pain — chronic, episodic, or in flare. Resources, peer support, and ways to share your story.
Find what fitsCaregiver to a person with lived or living experienceYou walk alongside someone with pain. Tools for the appointments, the school and work navigation, and the weight you carry.
Find what fitsParent to a person with lived or living experienceYour kid lives with pain. Trusted resources for parents — including pediatric-specific guides and the youth-facing tools they can use too.
Find what fitsHealthcare providerClinical resources, evidence reviews, and partnerships for clinicians and allied health across Ontario.
For professionalsPolicymakerBriefings, submissions, and the data and lived-experience evidence behind better pain policy in Ontario.
Policy workChangemakerCommunity partner, organization, or collaborator looking to work alongside us. Donate, partner, volunteer, or amplify the work in your circles.
Get involvedOur work is built around four pillars that move together — none of them work alone.
Linking people with pain, families, clinicians, and researchers so no one navigates pain alone.
Plain-language information and clinician resources grounded in current evidence and lived experience.
Partnering with patient-oriented research networks so the evidence base reflects who lives with pain.
Policy work that pushes Ontario to recognize, fund, and treat chronic pain seriously.
These aren’t decoration. They shape what we work on, how we work, and who is at the table.
Pain is real, complex, and often invisible. We work to change the cultural and clinical narratives that dismiss people in pain.
Pain care reflects the systems it’s built inside. We name those systems and push to change them.
People living with pain and the people who care for them are experts in their own lives. Our work centres them.
Care that respects the person and is grounded in the best available evidence — not one or the other.
Ontario has the expertise, resources, and voices to change that. Pain Ontario is here to organize the work — building on the momentum of Health Canada’s Action Plan for Pain in Canada.
Read more about our workNews, policy moments, and ways to take part. We send when we have something to say — not on a schedule.
Pain Ontario is a registered nonprofit. Donations fund the resources, research partnerships, and advocacy that make better pain care possible across the province.
Peer support, care navigation, and plain-language resources for people with pain.
Awareness, education, and the work to dismantle obstacles to good pain care.
Policy submissions and advocacy that push Ontario to take pain seriously.
