Proposal and Test-Retest Reliability of a Scale for Cervical, Thoracic, and Lumbar Spine Pain in Brazilian Young People

Abstract

Objective: To propose and analyze the test-retest reliability of an instrument to verify the presence and intensity of pain in the cervical, thoracic and lumbar spine in Brazilian young people.Methods: This reliability study enrolled a sample of 458 participants (13 to 20 years). Two groups were formed for each sex according to the range of days for the test-retest (10±3 and 28±2 days). For analysis of spinal pain, a drawing of the human body with cervical, thoracic and lumbar spine areas delimited was presented. The following question was presented: during a normal day, do you feel pain in any of these regions of your spine? If so, what is the intensity from 0 to 10 (mark on the line)? The starting point, with the number 0, corresponded to no pain, and the number 10 to severe pain. The agreement of frequency and of intensity of pain was verified by Kappa test and Bland-Altman plot, respectively.Results: Intraclass correlation coefficients ranged from 0.71 (confidence interval of 95% - 95%CI - 0.59-0.79) to 0.94 (95%CI 0.90-0.96). The results concerning the agreement of pain scores showed the mean differences to be close to 0, and the largest mean difference was -0.40 (95%CI -5.14-4.34). The agreement in reported pain ranged from 72.2 (Kappa 0.43; 95%CI 0.28-0.58) to 90.1% (Kappa 0.76; 95%CI 0.60-0.92).Conclusions: This instrument was shown to be a reliable manner to verify the pain in different regions of the spine in Brazilian young people.

Longitudinal study of associated factors with adolescent health: Method and sample profile

“…For BMI, although different criteria were adopted, the proportion above the cut-offs was also similar. The frequency of spinal pain was lower than previously described 20 , this was due the fact that moderate spinal pain was used as a cut-off in the present study.…”

“…Spinal pain (cervical, thoracic, and lumbar) was verified using an instrument proposed for young people 20 . In the analysis of the presence of pain in the spine, a value ≥3 cm on scale was used as an indicator of the presence of pain equal to or greater than moderate 21 .…”

Evaluation Instruments for Assessing Back Pain in Athletes: A Systematic Review Protocol

“…Thus, it is essential to create a global database that collects large-scale information on back health, considering the specific lifestyle habits of the population, to be able to deepen the study of its large-scale effect. An increasing number of questionnaires are also available for use in research and in the assessment of back pain in different populations [ 30 , 31 , 32 ].…”