PayneRichard Payne, Esther Colliflower Professor of Medicine and Divinity at Duke Divinity School, has been named to the Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (IPRCC) of the National Institutes of Health by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services.

The IPRCC is a federal advisory committee that supports pain research and promotes collaboration across the government to improve understanding of pain and pain-related treatments. The committee was created as part of the Affordable Care Act.

Payne is an internationally known expert in the areas of pain relief, care for those near death, oncology, and neurology. He has received a Distinguished Service Award from the American Pain Society, of which he is president; the Humanitarian Award from the Urban Resources Institute; and the Janssen Excellence in Pain Award.

He is also the John B. Francis Chair in Bioethics at the Center for Practical Bioethics, a nationally recognized nonprofit organization that helps patients and their families, healthcare professionals, policymakers, and corporate leaders grapple with ethically complex issues in medicine and research.