The State-of-“Cultural Validity” of Self-Report Pain Assessment Tools in Diverse Older Adults: Table 1

Abstract

The multiculturalism of health care and the use of existing pain assessment tools globally require that clinicians and researchers consider tool validity that incorporates the individual's cultural system in order to provide quality pain assessment. This article addresses one aspect of tool development and application across populations, the validation of self-report pain assessment tools for culturally diverse older adults. Recommendations for each the research and clinician are provided to assist in development, translation, and use of various self-report pain assessment tools.

Practice recommendations for pain assessment by self-report with African American older adults

“…60 However, there are significant gaps in best practices for pain assessment using self-report pain measurement tools in ethnically diverse older adults. 81 The task of identifying culturally-preferred assessment tools was undertaken by Stuppy 82 who discovered that older African Americans preferred the Faces Pain Scale (FPS). Other research confirms that both cognitively intact and impaired older African Americans prefer the FPS-revised (FPS-R) compared to the Verbal Descriptor Scale (VDS), the Numeric Rating Scale (NRS), and the Iowa Pain Thermometer (IPT).…”

Barriers and Solutions for Improving Pain Management Practices in Acute Hospital Settings: Perspectives of Healthcare Practitioners for a Pain-Free Hospital Initiative

“…4) The cultural validity of self-reported pain assessment tools should also be considered, and adjustments should be made to incorporate cultural views and tailor the language to suit the local population. 24) For example, words may have different meanings, confounding patients' understanding of their pain experience. Further work is required to establish shared meanings and pain descriptors due to the variety of languages spoken locally.…”

Focused Evidence Review: Psychometric Properties of Patient-Reported Outcome Measures for Chronic Musculoskeletal Pain

“…Generalizability of psychometric findings is thus limited by both demographic underreporting and population homogeneity. Given substantial evidence of the influence of age and psychosocial factors on individuals' experiences and reporting of both pain-related functional impairment and pain severity, 76,77,80,81 there is a need for consensus on key study population demographic and clinical characteristics, more consistent reporting of these population characteristics within studies, and further research on how measures' psychometric properties generalize or change across age ranges and psychosocial categories.…”

“…This decision was supported by evidence on the limited generalizability of self-report measures' psychometric properties across languages and highlights the need for linguistic and cultural validation of pain measures. 80,82 With respect to search strategy, our primary abstract search was limited to 2000 onward. We complemented this, however, by applying no date limits to hand-searches of included studies' reference lists, other reviews, and expert/peer reviewer suggestions.…”