The word‐graphic rating scale as a measure of children's and adolescents' pain intensity

Abstract

A program of studies was designed to select and test a pain intensity scale for inclusion in a multidimensional pain assessment tool for children and adolescents. The focus was on determining each scale's validity, reliability, ease of use, preference, and the lack of age, gender, and ethnic biases. Five pain scales were evaluated in four separate studies: a word-graphic rating scale, a visual analogue scale, a graded-graphic rating scale, a magnitude estimation scale (0 to 10), and a color scale. Subjects (N = 1,223) were 8 to 17 years of age and, in three of the studies, were hospitalized and judged to be in pain. In Study 1, well children used the scales to assess pain in an analogue situation selecting the color scale easiest to use and best liked. Convergent validity for the five scales was supported. In Study 2, hospitalized children, who were experiencing pain, overwhelmingly selected the word-graphic rating scale as their choice. A pilot version of a multidimensional pain assessment tool incorporating the word-graphic rating scale was tested in Study 3 using a repeated measures design. The scale demonstrated sensitivity to changes in postoperative pain intensity over time. In Study 4, convergent validity of the five scales and test-retest reliability of the word-graphic rating scale were supported. The series of four studies provides strong evidence to support use of the word-graphic rating scale to measure pain intensity in pediatric populations.

Children's pre-operative tonsillectomy pain education: Clinical outcomes

“…Estimates of validity were initially reported with children 8-17 years for both written and verbal administration [5,29]. Validity was demonstrated for the written scale by moderate correlations (r = .56, P < 0.01) between children's reported pain intensity and their extent of injury [29].…”

“…Common causes for children's pre-operative anxiety are fear of the unknown, needles, and post-operative pain [2]. Despite school age children's interest in pre-operative pain preparation [3] and their ability to describe pain [4,5], little is known about the clinical outcomes pre-operative pain education has on children's anxiety and postoperative pain experiences. In addition, parental satisfaction with health care is related to clinicians' providing developmentally appropriate information directly to their child [6].…”

Children’s Self‐Reports of Pain Intensity: Scale Selection, Limitations and Interpretation

“…Adjective scales involve selecting a word out of a set of descriptors of pain intensity (28). These scales require verbal fluency at a high school level and have not been investigated extensively with children.…”

Cultural Validation of the Adolescent Pediatric Pain Tool (APPT) in portuguese children with cancer

“…Contudo, em Portugal não está disponível para crianças e adolescentes um instrumento de avaliação que permita a identificação conjunta da intensidade, localização e qualidade da dor, tal como existe para os adultos (Figueiral, 2002). Um dos instrumentos de avaliação da dor de uso corrente no contexto norte-americano é o Adolescent Pediatric PainTool (APPT) (Savedra, Tesler, Holzemer, & Brokaw, 1995;Savedra, Tesler, Holzemer, Wilkie, & Ward, 1989;Tesler et al, 1991;Wilkie et al, 1990). O instrumento foi criado com base no McGill Pain Questionnaire ( Wilkie et al, 1990) e tem sido aplicado predominantemente em crianças hospitalizadas com idades entre os 8 e os 17 anos, com doença oncológica, anemia falciforme e em pós-operatório, para avaliar a localização, intensidade e qualidade da dor ( Jacob, Mack, Savedra, van Cleve, & Wilkie, 2013;Fernandes, De Campos, Batalha, Perdigão, & Jacob, 2014).…”