Accessibility Statement

We believe everyone deserves equal access to information and advocacy tools — especially people living with disabilities.

Our Commitment

The American Pain & Disability Foundation (4APDF) is committed to ensuring digital accessibility for people of all abilities. We actively work to meet or exceed the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 Level AA standards across our website.

Many of our community members live with chronic pain conditions that affect vision, mobility, cognitive function, and the ability to use traditional input devices. Accessibility is not an afterthought for us — it is central to our mission.

What We Do

✓Semantic HTML with proper heading hierarchy and landmark regions
✓Color contrast ratios meeting or exceeding WCAG AA (4.5:1 for normal text)
✓Full keyboard navigation — every feature is usable without a mouse
✓Screen reader compatible with ARIA labels and roles where needed
✓Form inputs with visible labels, error messages, and autocomplete support
✓Touch targets sized at 44px minimum for mobile and assistive device users
✓Responsive, mobile-first design that works on any screen size
✓No auto-playing media or aggressive animations
✓Skip-to-content link for keyboard users
✓Focus indicators visible on all interactive elements
✓Automated accessibility testing in our continuous integration pipeline

Standards We Follow

We target conformance with WCAG 2.1 Level AA, the standard referenced by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for web accessibility. Our site is regularly audited against these guidelines, and we use automated testing tools (axe-core) as part of every release.

Known Limitations

While we strive for full compliance, some content may have limitations:

•User-submitted content (patient stories) may not always meet contrast or formatting standards — we review and correct these during editorial review.
•Some embedded third-party content (donation forms, social media) may have accessibility limitations outside our control.
•PDF documents uploaded to the resources section may not be fully accessible — we are working to remediate these.

Feedback & Contact

If you encounter an accessibility barrier on our website, we want to hear about it. Please contact us and we will work to resolve the issue promptly:

How: Use the 💬 Feedback button in the bottom-right corner of any page and select "Bug" as the type.
Include: The page URL, a description of the barrier, and your assistive technology (if applicable).
Response time: We aim to respond within 3 business days and resolve issues within 10 business days.

When reporting an issue, please include the page URL, a description of the problem, and what assistive technology you are using (if applicable). This helps us reproduce and fix the issue faster.

Continuous Improvement

Accessibility is an ongoing effort. We conduct regular audits, incorporate accessibility into our development process, and train our content publishers on accessible content creation. This statement was last reviewed on September 6, 2026.

Everyone deserves access to chronic pain advocacy resources.

Report an Accessibility Issue

Our Commitment

What We Do

✓Semantic HTML with proper heading hierarchy and landmark regions

✓Color contrast ratios meeting or exceeding WCAG AA (4.5:1 for normal text)

✓Full keyboard navigation — every feature is usable without a mouse

✓Screen reader compatible with ARIA labels and roles where needed

✓Form inputs with visible labels, error messages, and autocomplete support

✓Touch targets sized at 44px minimum for mobile and assistive device users

✓Responsive, mobile-first design that works on any screen size

✓No auto-playing media or aggressive animations

✓Skip-to-content link for keyboard users

✓Focus indicators visible on all interactive elements

✓Automated accessibility testing in our continuous integration pipeline

Known Limitations

While we strive for full compliance, some content may have limitations:

•User-submitted content (patient stories) may not always meet contrast or formatting standards — we review and correct these during editorial review.

•Some embedded third-party content (donation forms, social media) may have accessibility limitations outside our control.

•PDF documents uploaded to the resources section may not be fully accessible — we are working to remediate these.

Feedback & Contact

If you encounter an accessibility barrier on our website, we want to hear about it. Please contact us and we will work to resolve the issue promptly:

When reporting an issue, please include the page URL, a description of the problem, and what assistive technology you are using (if applicable). This helps us reproduce and fix the issue faster.