Articles: pain-measurement.
-
Arthritis care & research · Dec 2017
Fibromyalgia and the Prediction of Two-Year Changes in Functional Status in Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients.
Previous cross-sectional studies have shown that rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients with fibromyalgia (FM) have higher disease activity, greater medical costs, and worse quality of life compared to RA patients without FM. We determined the impact of FM on 2-year changes in the functional status of RA patients in a prospective study. ⋯ Both the presence of FM and increasing number of FM symptoms predicted worsening of functional status among individuals with RA. Among individuals with RA and FM, the magnitude of the difference in changes in MDHAQ was 4- to 7-fold higher than typical changes in MDHAQ score among individuals with established RA.
-
Arthritis care & research · Dec 2017
Comparative StudyImpact of Moving From a Widespread to Multisite Pain Definition on Other Fibromyalgia Symptoms.
To investigate whether associations between pain and the additional symptoms associated with fibromyalgia are different in persons with chronic widespread pain (CWP) compared to multisite pain (MSP), with or without joint areas. ⋯ This large-scale study demonstrates that regardless of the pain definition used, the magnitude of association between pain and other associated symptoms of fibromyalgia is similar. This finding supports the continued collection of both when classifying fibromyalgia, but highlights the fact that pain may not require to follow the definition outlined within the 1990 American College of Rheumatology criteria.
-
Pain catastrophizing (PC) is associated with more severe and disabling migraine attacks. However, factors that moderate this relationship are unknown. Failure of inhibitory control (IC), or the ability to suppress automatic or inappropriate responses, may be one such factor given previous research showing a relationship between higher PC and lower IC in non-migraine samples, and research showing reduced IC in migraine. Therefore, we examined whether lower IC interacts with increased PC to predict greater migraine severity as measured by pain intensity, attack frequency, and duration. ⋯ Results showed that lower IC interacted with higher PC, both overall and specific subcomponents, to predict higher pain intensity during migraine attacks. Future studies are needed to determine whether interventions to improve IC could lead to less painful migraine attacks via improvements in PC.
-
Chronic pain is characterized by a complex interaction of somatic, mental and social factors. Assessing these factors in patients with chronic pain is vital during the diagnostic work-up and when making a structured treatment plan. Interdisciplinary pain assessment (ISA) is the most promising method to deal with these challenges. This article presents our experience in performing pain assessments in the hospital setting and also illustrates the characteristic features of chronic pain patients undergoing such assessments. ⋯ Our study shows that ISA enables fast, high-quality diagnostic assessments of chronic pain while taking the biopsychosocial model of pain in particular into account. In addition, ISA is not biased with regard to outcome results and recommends the further treatment that appears best for the individual patient. ISA leads not only to inpatient treatment, but also to treatment in other therapeutic settings and, as such, is not merely a door-opener to multimodal pain therapy.
-
The authors present a system for nomenclature and documentation of symptoms and signs associated with pain. The system was compiled in a staged process by the study group for methods and documentation of pain-associated symptoms and signs (Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Methodik und Dokumentation von Schmerzbefunden [AMDS]). The suggested items were elaborated from terms used in current national and international guidelines and classifications and in part integrated into superordinate terms. ⋯ The items for the description of pain-associated symptoms and signs are divided into the areas of algesiomotor, psychoalgesiological and somatoalgesiological findings. The aim is the documentation of a multidimensional algesiological description of findings with defined terminology, which can serve as a comparable and unified standard, particularly in the field of pain assessment. The AMDS system should enable a systematic description of pain, which is a reliable foundation for diagnostics, therapy planning and expert case evaluation.