Visual Analog Scale pain reporting was standardized

Kane, Robert L.; Bershadsky, Boris; Rockwood, Todd; Saleh, Khaled; Islam, Nazir C.

doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2004.11.017

« Previous Next »Journal of Clinical Epidemiology
Volume 58, Issue 6 , Pages 618-623, June 2005

Visual Analog Scale pain reporting was standardized

Robert L. Kane
- Clinical Outcomes Research Center, University of Minnesota, D351 Mayo (MMC 197), Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- Corresponding author. Tel.: 612-624-1185; fax: 612-624-8448.
Boris Bershadsky
- Clinical Outcomes Research Center, University of Minnesota, D351 Mayo (MMC 197), Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
Todd Rockwood
- Clinical Outcomes Research Center, University of Minnesota, D351 Mayo (MMC 197), Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
Khaled Saleh
- Clinical Outcomes Research Center, University of Minnesota, D351 Mayo (MMC 197), Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- Department of Orthopedics, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- Present address: Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA.
Nazir C. Islam
- Clinical Outcomes Research Center, University of Minnesota, D351 Mayo (MMC 197), Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA
- School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA

Accepted 1 November 2004.

Abstract

Background and Objective

Whereas pain is frequently measured using a visual analog scale (VAS) that can examine change over short time intervals in the same subject, such ratings are not useful in analyzing differences across subjects. We created a method for normalizing VAS pain reporting to control for the variation between different populations due to the differences in subjective perception or objective evaluation of pain.

Methods

A list of 226 pains was gathered from a convenience sample of persons on the street and patients waiting at medical and orthopedic clinics. These pains were ranked according to severity by health professionals and 19 pains with the most stable rankings were selected. These 19 pains were then rated by a sample of community-dwelling persons and a method of VAS standardization was developed, based on six selected pains.

Results

Individual variations in pain ratings were found to be independent of respondent age and gender, but were correlated with experience of the event or behavior and with self-reported health status. A new scoring method that takes into account these correlations is proposed.